When I was around the age of eleven
or twelve years old, a very kind neighbour gave me a set of old books.
Published variously around the 1920s and 1930s, they had beautiful bindings.
Their titles mostly related to a range of similar topics: archaeology, the
natural world, travel. I recall a few them: A History of Roman Britain; The
Countryside Companion; and, A Journey through the Holy Land and the
Levant. But there was one book in particular which fascinated me – it was a
large and weighty tome with warm, antique red-coloured covers. It had an image
of the Buddha embossed upon its spine, and a three-quarter view of the
Acropolis similarly embossed on its cover, suggesting the words this book
contained might combine the twinned qualities of serenity and wisdom. The pages
within promised to reveal the knowledge of past ages and far-away places. The
book’s title, written in gilt lettering on the spine, hinted that such gnostic
notions might in fact be true. From the comforts of an armchair, when stuck
indoors on a rainy day, this book was the perfect companion. A book in which to
lose oneself while leafing through its pages, yellowed with slow passing time.
It was a book to peruse and explore. And it is a book which I still own and which
I still enjoy poring over today. Its title is simply: Wonders of the World.
Filled with an encyclopaedic wealth
of articles, illustrated with grainy black and white photographs, and the occasional
colour-plate, usually a painting of a beautiful view – Wonders of the World
describes itself as: “A popular and authentic account of the marvels of
nature and of men as they exist to-day.” There is no list of authors next
to its table of contents, although I believe other (later?) editions credit the
various contributors, some of whom were the most popular travel writers of their
day, writers such as Sir Harry Johnston and Perceval Landon. The book’s ‘Foreword’,
however, is appended by the signature of Sir Philip Gibbs, KBE. Although now
largely forgotten, Gibbs was a prolific and very popular writer during his time.
Perhaps best known for his forthright anti-war stance which he expressed in a number of newspaper correspondence pieces and books, such as The
Realities of War, which was published in the USA under the title, Now It
Can Be Told (1920). Highly critical of modern trench warfare, his journalistic
work aimed to expose the full horrors of the First World War, raising the level
of public awareness when official Government censorship was finally lifted, and
strongly advocating for greater efforts to be made in mediating international confrontations
through means of diplomacy. Something which he believed should be the most
essential role of the League of Nations.
There is certainly a range of different
voices in evidence, but the written tone of the anonymously authored articles
collected in Wonders of the World is uniformly neat and clipped, rather like
that of a chirpy narrator accompanying an old British Movietone News bulletin or
Pathé
newsreel. There is no publication date given in the book, but a written
inscription dated 1933 in my copy suggests it was published around the late
1920s, or perhaps very early 1930s. It is a book embodying a certain sort of
global outlook, a book born of the age of Western imperialism. A book which
marvels at the power and spectacle of nature, and a book which takes pride in
the ingenuity of mankind and ‘progress’, as much as it values reflecting on the
past. Asking where have we come from, where are we now, and where are we going?
– Reflecting the times in which the book was made, it is resonant with the kind
of voices I heard from my grandparent’s generation. And, by strange coincidence,
the book was published by Odhams, who were based in Watford from 1935, and who later
merged with Sun Printers, where my grandfather worked until his retirement.
Perhaps it was only natural then,
just as now – when reading Wonders of the World, I often hear its words
sounding in my head as if spoken in the voice of the elderly neighbour who
gifted it to me. Mr and Mrs C., were an elderly couple who lived across the
street. They’d taken me under their wing when I’d got to know them at a
Christmas gathering in one of our neighbour’s houses. They very kindly gave me
an open invitation to pop round whenever I liked to see them, and so, every once
in a while, I’d stroll over to their house and ring the doorbell. Welcoming me
inside, I’d often help Mr C. tinkering in his garage, where he taught me how to
use a soldering iron and other basic metalworking skills. He gave me some of
the first few tools I’d ever owned which we’d refurbished together from the rusty
old things which we found buried in his garage, tools that had long lain unused
and unloved. He always wore an old RAF beret to protect the thin strands of his
neatly brylcreemed hair and a brown coat to protect his immaculately clean
shirt and tie from the many greasy black marks it had acquired over time. There was a spare brown coat for me to wear
too, similarly redolent with the smell of oil and grease, if a little on the large size.
Mr C.’s garage was a veritable
Aladdin’s cave of light or model engineering. Precision tools, such
as a mini-lathe, which he worked with dexterous hands; enlivened by the sparks
struck from fast spinning grinding wheels and the sound of electric motors
driving drills, circular saws, and polishing mops. I learnt a lot of the skills
from him which I’d later put to good use in making mounts for museum objects. I
very fondly remember the fun of afternoons spent pottering away in there with
him, working together on some project or other, particularly on a warm, rainy day with the garage
doors propped open to keep the place safely aired.
Afterwards, we’d go back indoors,
washing the persistent black dirt off our hands and sometimes our faces too! – We’d
then sit relaxing in the lounge with Mrs C., looking out over their well-kept garden
with its neatly trimmed green lawn and beautiful rose bushes, chatting over a
freshly made pot of tea and very generous slices of homemade cake. I loved
those long afternoons spent in their company. Sadly I have no photos of Mr and
Mrs C., just fond memories and this beautiful old book to remind me of those happy
afternoons when I was growing up.
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| The Buddha at Kamakura, Japan |
Leafing through the pages of Wonders
of the World when I was younger, I found the twin passions of my future
life crystallising there in a longing to know more about the world and its
different peoples – its geography, and, in particular, its many varied
histories – and the longing to experience both by travelling to such varied and
distant places. When I began writing Waymarks, a little over ten years
ago, I had a rough idea that I wanted this blog to be a kind of personal
recreation of that old compendium with its embossed red covers and its
dignified gilt lettering on the spine. In many ways though, the pieces I have
written and gathered together here on Waymarks were originally meant to
serve as aide memoires to myself (often substitutes for the travel
diaries I’d failed either to write or finish writing at the time when I was travelling). But also, I saw
them as conversational pieces to share via the open ‘samizdat’ forum of
the internet. Posted here in the hope that they might be of interest to others
with a similar sense of curiosity and experiences akin to mine. I now realise,
however, that these illustrated essays were perhaps also an unconscious means
of continuing those afternoon conversations with the old couple who lived
across the road.
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| Temples & Feluccas - Travelling in Egypt |
Mr and Mrs C. would often ask me about
all the things I’d like to do with my life when I grew up – my dreams of
working in museums and travelling the world. In turn, I’d quiz them about all
the things they had seen and done, as well as all the places they’d visited and
explored when they were younger. Together, we’d discuss the world in wider ways
too – ranging through topics such as science, geography, history, current
affairs, art and books – in essence encapsulating all the things I’ve continued
to do and be interested by ever since; living an inquisitive life of thought
and reflection, seeking out my own ‘wonders of the world’, recording and
cataloguing my experiences in the photos, short films and essays which I’ve
posted here as a kind of electronic scrapbook. In many ways – though far from
complete – I’d like to think that Waymarks is my reply to that familiar
question which they always used to ask me when I visited them: “What have you
been up to lately?” – These are the reminiscences I’d tell them if I were able
to sit down once again with Mr and Mrs C. in their living room, overlooking
their lovely garden, drinking tea and eating homemade cake, while chatting away
the long happy hours of the afternoon together.
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| Segovia's "El Puente" - Spain |
~ Envoi ~
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| A Visit to Teotihuacan, Mexico |
It takes a lot of time and
effort to put together each blog post. In that sense, ten years is in fact
quite a milestone. It has been heartening, though, to receive personal messages
from people grateful for some of the information I’ve shared here. And, similarly,
it has been disheartening to see some of the personal research which I’ve
shared reused in other contexts without any credit. Most depressing of all though
has been to see certain ‘travel bloggers’ repost my content whole on their own
blogs – presumably appropriating my original writing in order to capitalise on
the revenue generated by hosting adverts; something which I very deliberately
chose not to do when starting out, and also one of the reasons why I chose to
use the Blogger platform rather than the more popular Wordpress one,
specifically because it could be ad free. However, it is immensely difficult to
combat this and to get my appropriated content removed from these blog thieves.
On this platform you can’t speak to anyone on the administrative ‘support’ side
directly. You can only report each stolen blog post individually via an on-line
form, and when you have over 200 posts pirated that’s an exhausting prospect,
and if you do attempt it – which I did – it soon thinks you are a “bot”
spamming the system. Life’s too short.
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| The NW Coast by Rail - USA to Canada |
Consequently, after ten years,
it is perhaps time to turn my attention to other things – not least, at long
last, to the completion of my PhD thesis, the deadline for which is now drawing
frighteningly close. I have other writing projects, both academic and
non-academic, which I want to work on as well, such as collecting and
re-editing some of the essays originally written for Waymarks into a proper
book (though maybe not such a lavish one as ‘Wonders of the World’). So while I
am drawing a line here and signing off for now, I’m looking at this as a hiatus
rather than a farewell. Waymarks may resume at some point, either here
or perhaps on some other web forum (but this site will continue to be actively
monitored and regularly maintained by me personally). If you have been a
regular reader or if you have only popped by occasionally, many thanks for
doing so – I’m very glad you have, and I hope you found Waymarks of
interest.
Tim
Chamberlain
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| Exploring Mughal Delhi |
‘Waymarks’
– 2011-2021 – A blog about:
HISTORY
| TRAVEL | MUSEUMS | BOOKS
And
everything in-between
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| 1904 - Tibet's Marriage with Modernity |
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| Nama Amida Butsu |