Foreign Land: A Novel

by Jonathan Raban

From the bestselling, award-winning author of Bad Land comes a quirky and insightful novel of what can happen when one can and does go home again.

"Raban's achievements in this novel are nothing short of awesome." — The Washington Post

For the past thirty years, George Grey has been a ship bunker in the fictional west African nation of Montedor, but now he's returning home to England—to a daughter who's a famous author he barely knows, to a peculiar new friend who back in the sixties was one of England's more famous singers, and to the long and empty days of retirement during which he's easy prey to the melancholy of memories, all the more acute since the woman he loves is still back in Africa. Witty, charming and masterly crafted, Foreign Land is an exquisitely moving tale of awkward relationships and quiet redemption.

Genres: Fiction, Literary Fiction

352 pages, Paperback

First published June 6, 1985

About the author

British travel writer, critic and novelist

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan...

Reviews

[Jez · Rating 2 out of 5]

well-written in snatches but desperately soporific

[Erik Meyer · Rating 4 out of 5]

This would be a 3,5 - 4 for me. It has many of the Raban Qualities (like the enticing vignettes of odd people, in this novel even more fleshed out than in his travel books), the very witty writing and the lively coasting around in a sailboat. The crises of George „feel“ autobiographical at many points (complicated relationship with vicar-father, troubled marriages, restlessness) but my guess is as good as yours as to how much really went into this. The many „missed connections“ make the story feel a bit inconclusive and might leave the reader wanting a more wholesome end, but thats rather the point I guess. Not my favourite of Raban, but still enjoyable.

[Bill · Rating 4 out of 5]

Character study of an Englishman who has lived a comfortable, happy existence abroad and abruptly must return home to live the end of his life in a native land that is hostile, cold, and unrecognizable to him. Worse, he must attempt to establish some sort of relationship with his daughter, who is the last part of his family, but neither understands the other at all and the exercise is painful. If that sounds depressing, well, it is, but Raban writes so beautifully that his unstinting examination of the essential awkwardness of human relationship is worth the trip.

[Jan Morrison]

What a wonderful novel! I've read Reagan's non-fiction and loved it but this book is a gem. It's like the offspring of Greene and Ondaatje. Hope there is more but I may read some of his travelish books until I have a chance to look. I know we have Coasting.

[Michael · Rating 1 out of 5]

I kept waiting for the story to develop into something interesting. The context should have helped it do so, but it didn't. The main character remained weak and emotionless. I found it difficult to believe that such a wet wimp could really exist.

[Graham · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book ultimately very moving. It took a long time to get into it, and I nearly stopped reading at some points, but it was well worth persisting to the end. It was like living an entire life.
The very non-sequential narrative - interrupted by nautical stuff, and visitations by ghosts from the past - was a bit disorientating, but it did fit well with the deteriorating (or transcending?) mental state of George, the protagonist. The ending was abrupt, but I think Jonathan Raban ended the story at the right point. (spoiler alert) We don't know whether or not George will reconnect with, Vera, his African love, or become a victim of civil war. We don't know what becomes of the people he cares about in England either. There are quite a few loose ends. But this uncertainty makes life, and the novel, all the more poignant.
It's not a book all will enjoy. There's a lot that only readers who have lived in England will get. I have, and had similar experiences returning there, so I could relate.

I would have liked a little more insight into the minds and hearts of Vera and Angela. We are allowed into the POV of the other two main female characters, Sheila and Diana. It would have made the book even more moving.
This was Raban's first novel, and the first of his I have read. I am interested to see how his writing reads in subsequent work.

[Seednot · Rating 5 out of 5]

A really enjoyable and brilliant late 20th century novel (1985). I liked everything about it, including the end... George Grey has lived and worked for most of his adult life in a small (ex-Portuguese colonial) African country. Upon retirement he returns to Britain searching for a stake in the country that he has been away from for so long. The distance in miles, time & societal changes is hard for him to fathom. The relationship he wants to rekindle with his daughter splutters and struggles to get going, with both adults perspectives of the other shifting in and out of focus as they try and make things work. With plenty of well drawn and memorable characters from that period, George finds his salvation in a lovely old sailing ketch that he allows himself to be persuaded to buy. Navigating the sea by dead reckoning (working from a known position but without markers) gives him the opportunity to bring his thoughts into focus, much like solid land appearing through the sea mist. The reader can take pleasure from the author's knowledge of seafaring. George's passage through sea and story, whilst being very challenging at times can also be quite funny. Fortunately his voyage does appear to be on course for a satisfactory conclusion though Raban teasingly leaves this open for the reader to decide.

[Ross Howard-Hildige · Rating 3 out of 5]

a very well written novel, with a story line that meanders and threatens to be exciting, but never follows through. This might just be real patience and persistence on the author's part, and play into the story's themes, which focus on a main character who worries that he's too boring, but I still found certain parts a drag. But the insight into the main character, his relationship with his daughter, his ex wife, and his deceased parents is always incisive, and sometimes very touching.

[Jackie · Rating 3 out of 5]

What a strange book. I quite liked it though.

[Sandra · Rating 4 out of 5]

A warm and joyful read, peppered with some nasty female manipulation.

[Len · Rating 4 out of 5]

George Grey, long since divorced and living a life he loves controlling a bunkering station in a former Portuguese territory in West Africa, has to face being required to retire and return to Britain. Sad old rainy, windy, cold, unfriendly Britain. If only Mr Grey and everyone else in the cast had an occasional ray of sunshine within them. It is very difficult to feel much empathy for anyone and certainly not for such a curmudgeonly old complainer as George Grey. He's had a few knocks in his life – haven't we all by the time we reach retirement. I know how his daughter Sheila felt once I had listened to all his complaints about the house he has inherited from his parents, the Cornish village he lives in, the admittedly pretty obnoxious ersatz upper class bores with whom he has to socialise, British television, those simply awful lower class people on the council estates, the surly shopkeepers, the dirt, the graffiti. By the end I was nearly ready to tell him to go back where he came from when, blow me, he stocks up his boat, sails south, and before long he's in warmer waters receiving free tunas from a Spanish fishing fleet.

And then there is the sailing lore. Once George Grey sets sail in the Calliope there is so much seafaring and navigational knowledge included it's like going back to the days of juvenile stories of high adventure in sailing boats: Gilbert Hackforth-Jones' Green Sailors series, Strang Morrison for more muscular tussles with the elements, and Geoffrey Prout, who wrote many novels for Sea Scouts, though is best remembered as the author of the unfortunately titled yet completely innocent Scouts in Bondage. I have only a fleeting interest in the ways of the sea; and as for navigation, well, I recall an interview given by Arthur Marshall years ago – he was once a schoolteacher – in which he mentioned a sarcastic remark on a pupil's Geography report: “Does well to find his way home.” Now that pupil could have been me, and reading Foreign Land has not improved by antipathy to the subject.

Poor George has heart trouble and there is something wrong with an important part of his boat: a couple of people have a prod around, make a sucking sound through their teeth, and tell him unhelpfully, “You want to get that seen to, pal.” George ignores them. He's had the boat professionally surveyed, he makes a point of saying. He also drowns his heart trouble in multiple bottles of Chivas Regal. Thank heavens he's a survivor, but isn't that the way of salty old sea dogs.

[Zeena Price · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was based on such a promising premise that I couldn't wait to get started. Unfortunately, it was a huge anti-climax, so disappointing that I didn't even finish it (which almost never happens)!

Written by the famed Jonathan Raban, Foreign Land is the story of an Englishman who has just returned from a naval stint in Africa. The themes vary from the empty boredom of retirement, the obsession with escape, disillusionment with one's "own" country, whatever that means, and strained relationships with family. All of which could have been written in an emotionally engaging, lyrical and compelling manner. Instead the writing felt tired, flat, and dull- almost as though the author was bored of his own efforts. The characters felt wooden and irritating, the dialogue dated. The plot didn't amount to anything- though I suppose having stopped thirty pages before the end I may not be in a position to comment.

Overall, I was left with a feeling that this could have been an excellent read, but that it sadly missed the mark.

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent. Raban returns to an international and English setting this time as a novelist. I was just getting used to him writing Surveilance as an American, but enjoyed the British terms and phrasing in this one. Another "coming of old age". The conversations with people from the past take a little getting used to, but fill in the rich story. You can't go home again, or can you? My only regret was that it ended in the middle of the boat trip.

[Steph · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wonderful writing, but the ending was rather abrupt.

[Linda · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not the authors best book. Enjoyable to read, especially if one is a sailor as there is a lot of sailing references. It is a bit disjointed though and I found the ending too abrupt.

[Lysergius · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lovely tale. Quite heart warming.

[Discontinuous Permafrost · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting novel, not as good as his travel/place based non-fiction.

[Steve · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't like how loosely he plays with the timeline in this book, but the writing itself is elegant and really makes me want to be asea