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The Traveller's Tree: A Journey Through the Caribbean Islands
In this, his first book, Patrick Leigh Fermor recounts his tales of a personal odyssey to the lands of the Traveller's Tree - a tall, straight-trunked tree whose sheath-like leaves collect copious amounts of water. He made his way through the long island chain of the West Indies by steamer, aeroplane and sailing ship, noting in his records of the voyage the minute details of daily life, of the natural surroundings and of the idiosyncratic and distinct civilisations he encountered amongst the Caribbean Islands. From the ghostly Ciboneys and the dying Caribs to the religious eccentricities like the Kingston Pocomaniacs and the Poor Whites in the Islands of the Saints, Patrick Leigh Fermor recreates a vivid world, rich and vigorous with life.
416 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1950
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1458 people want to read
About the author
Patrick Leigh Fermor
54 books587 followersSir Patrick Michael Leigh Fermor, OBE, DSO was of English and Irish descent. After his stormy schooldays, followed by his walk across Europe to Constantinople, he lived and travelled in the Balkans and the Greek Archipelago acquiring a deep interest in languages and remote places.
Fermor was an army officer who played a prominent role behind the lines in the Battle of Crete during World War II. He lived partly in Greece in a house he designed with his wife Joan in an olive grove in the Mani, and partly in Worcestershire. He was widely regarded as "Britain's greatest living travel writer".
Fermor was an army officer who played a prominent role behind the lines in the Battle of Crete during World War II. He lived partly in Greece in a house he designed with his wife Joan in an olive grove in the Mani, and partly in Worcestershire. He was widely regarded as "Britain's greatest living travel writer".
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January 7, 2018
In the late 1940s, Patrick Leigh Fermor and two friends (one, Joan, he would marry later), embarked on a voyage to the islands of the Caribbean. The result was this book, the first that Leigh Fermor published. Readers of his later travel books will recognize many of Leigh Fermor's main interests: language and music, architecture and folktales, history and botany. His interest in local characters, his ability to secure introductions to people who can offer him and his companions hospitality and access, his lyrical sense of place are all in evidence. The book traces their travels from island to island, covering 15 in all, plus a brief stopover in Puerto Rico. Leigh Fermor was intrigued by the practice of Voudou in Haiti, which helps to explain the three chapters he devotes to his experiences on the island, by far the most for any of the islands he visited.
From a historical perspective, this volume provides a fascinating look into the immediate post-WWII world of these islands, which were marked by past imperialism through slavery and the interests of imperial Western powers, as well as by the rise of the US as an economic, political, and cultural power following WWII. (Leigh Fermor complains about the ubiquity of Coca-Cola signs several times, a harbinger of global capitalism that we all recognize from our 21st-century vantage point.) Leigh Fermor is no friend of slavery, and he strongly criticizes certain white colonists for their racism, while also depicting slavery as a morally bankrupt system with serious long-term consequences. At the same time, though, Leigh Fermor reflects his culture's understanding of black islanders and their culture as being primitive, descriptions which are jarring to 21st-century readers. Additionally, when he weighs in on the best path for Caribbean social and political development, he argues that the approach of letting bygones be bygones is the best path forward, a position which seems, at best, naive today.
Even with these problems, the book provides an interesting look into Leigh Fermor's development as a traveller and a writer, and brims over with his curiosity and humanity. His lyrical descriptions of landscapes, and his profiles of the islanders, stay with the reader.
From a historical perspective, this volume provides a fascinating look into the immediate post-WWII world of these islands, which were marked by past imperialism through slavery and the interests of imperial Western powers, as well as by the rise of the US as an economic, political, and cultural power following WWII. (Leigh Fermor complains about the ubiquity of Coca-Cola signs several times, a harbinger of global capitalism that we all recognize from our 21st-century vantage point.) Leigh Fermor is no friend of slavery, and he strongly criticizes certain white colonists for their racism, while also depicting slavery as a morally bankrupt system with serious long-term consequences. At the same time, though, Leigh Fermor reflects his culture's understanding of black islanders and their culture as being primitive, descriptions which are jarring to 21st-century readers. Additionally, when he weighs in on the best path for Caribbean social and political development, he argues that the approach of letting bygones be bygones is the best path forward, a position which seems, at best, naive today.
Even with these problems, the book provides an interesting look into Leigh Fermor's development as a traveller and a writer, and brims over with his curiosity and humanity. His lyrical descriptions of landscapes, and his profiles of the islanders, stay with the reader.
April 28, 2022
The Traveller's Tree: A Journey Through the Caribbean Islands was a Goodreads referral and a book I threw into my research pile (I'm not sailing away to Jamaica anytime soon, I'm sad to report. The protagonist of the novel I'm writing grew up in the Caribbean, and I want to flesh out her childhood.) Published in 1950, this lengthy and quite detailed travelogue by Patrick Leigh Fermor is exactly what I wanted. He colors geography and history lessons with observations of customs and daily life, and does an excellent job of comparing and contrasting the islands. Here are some highlights:
On Guadeloupe. The proprietress, a blonde, middle-aged Parisian, complained bitterly about the way the French West Indies were run, and hinted regretfully that all was far better in the British possessions, especially with regard to sanitation, roads, public works and discipline. I felt there was an unspoken corollary that the blacks were “kept in their place” better in the British possessions, and that, as a result, all were happier. Her conversation had an undercurrent of disillusionment that was to become increasingly familiar throughout the Antilles.
On Dominica (not to be confused with the Dominican Republic.) The food in Roseau was pretty bad. After Martinique it was incredible that such disastrous results could be attained with the same raw materials. Terrible pink soups appeared, and potatoes disguised with Daddy’s Favorite Sauce, on whose awfulness it would be unpatriotic to enlarge. But the puddings were most interesting, and as we laboured with them, washing down intractable mouthfuls with Big Tree Burgandy, we invented names for them; a game that, in a perverted fashion, made us look forward to their appearance.
But these experiences were unable to break the charm of Dominica and the Dominicans, and of the little capital. The maid in Sutton House was tremendously old, kind and motherly and appropriately called Nanny, whom the faintest suggestion of a joke on our part would send off into transports of delight. Seeing that we looked a bit hangdog over our meals, she brought us a plateful of fried frogs–cwapaud–which were very good indeed. It is a justly celebrated Dominican dish.
On Barbados. The club system runs all through Barbadian life and the cold shoulder and the open snub are resorted to only when no legal quibble is available. It segregates the two races of islanders just as effectively as the most stringent colour discrimination in the United States, and not half so honestly. There, at least, loathsome as the American colour laws appear to me, Negroes knew exactly where they are. There is none of the mean juggling with the written word that prevails in Barbados, where, on paper, no colour bar exists. It is a pretty sad state of society when any white Barbadian or English pup can bounce in virtually where he chooses, while the elected head of Government, who is the island’s equivalent of the British Prime Minister, may have to hesitate and draw back. It must be one of the most disgustingly hypocritical systems in the world.
Except for Canefield and the kindness of our hostess, it was without a pang that we flew away to Trinidad.
On Trinidad. Drawing a comparison between Barbados and Trinidad is almost irresistible, and it is a contrast which, in spite of the beautiful churches and houses of Barbados and of the gracelessness and the sodden climate of Port of Spain, Trinidad, for me, wins hands down. Trinidadians are free of the characteristics which, among the Barbadians, impair the quiet beauty of the coral island; and whatever the colour feeling in Trinidad may be, it does not fly at you the moment you arrive and lodge in your gullet forever. The Trinidadians appear, by contrast, fantastically carefree and cheerful and definite, and the dominating attribute of the islanders, both black and white, is certainly their vitality.
On Haiti. Smart life in Haiti–the dazzling white tropical suits, the dark heads and hands–resembles a photographic negative. Cabane Choucoune, the fashionable nightclub of Port-au-Prince, is perched on the mountainside above the capital in the cool suburbs of Petionville. It is a replica of an African kraal, a great cylinder of bamboo with a steep conical roof which simultaneously achieves, by skill twist of sophistication, the amenities, the low lights and the luxury of an expensive night club with the atmosphere of the dwelling of an equatorial monarch.
Men in beautifully made white suits and dinner jackets danced with women dressed in the height of fashion. They were superb, far the best-looking we had seen in any of the islands: tall, broad-shouldered, narrow-waisted and long-legged, with a fine carriage of the head and great elegance of movement and gesture. What a relief to see this colour and splendour and extravagance after the shapeless dresses of the colonies! Many of our neighbours were pale in complexion, but the majority were of an imposing ebony. A woman sitting at the next table was perhaps the most beautiful in a room full of sable Venuses.
Fermor reserves the most space for Haiti--three chapters in all--and takes a deep dive into the country's Voodoo rituals, spending multiple nights at ceremonies. He distinguishes between the bush medicine applications of the religion and its rarer but more sensationalized accounts of evil spells or sorcerers which have only grown more infamous in pop culture since this account was published. My takeaway is that there's something special in Haiti--beyond the white man's fascination with Voodoo--that resort loclaes like Jamaica, Aruba or the Cayman Islands do not offer and the media, reporting on natural disasters, do not capture.
Recommended for those, like me, looking for a well-written and researched anthropological journey through the Caribbean.
On Guadeloupe. The proprietress, a blonde, middle-aged Parisian, complained bitterly about the way the French West Indies were run, and hinted regretfully that all was far better in the British possessions, especially with regard to sanitation, roads, public works and discipline. I felt there was an unspoken corollary that the blacks were “kept in their place” better in the British possessions, and that, as a result, all were happier. Her conversation had an undercurrent of disillusionment that was to become increasingly familiar throughout the Antilles.
On Dominica (not to be confused with the Dominican Republic.) The food in Roseau was pretty bad. After Martinique it was incredible that such disastrous results could be attained with the same raw materials. Terrible pink soups appeared, and potatoes disguised with Daddy’s Favorite Sauce, on whose awfulness it would be unpatriotic to enlarge. But the puddings were most interesting, and as we laboured with them, washing down intractable mouthfuls with Big Tree Burgandy, we invented names for them; a game that, in a perverted fashion, made us look forward to their appearance.
But these experiences were unable to break the charm of Dominica and the Dominicans, and of the little capital. The maid in Sutton House was tremendously old, kind and motherly and appropriately called Nanny, whom the faintest suggestion of a joke on our part would send off into transports of delight. Seeing that we looked a bit hangdog over our meals, she brought us a plateful of fried frogs–cwapaud–which were very good indeed. It is a justly celebrated Dominican dish.
On Barbados. The club system runs all through Barbadian life and the cold shoulder and the open snub are resorted to only when no legal quibble is available. It segregates the two races of islanders just as effectively as the most stringent colour discrimination in the United States, and not half so honestly. There, at least, loathsome as the American colour laws appear to me, Negroes knew exactly where they are. There is none of the mean juggling with the written word that prevails in Barbados, where, on paper, no colour bar exists. It is a pretty sad state of society when any white Barbadian or English pup can bounce in virtually where he chooses, while the elected head of Government, who is the island’s equivalent of the British Prime Minister, may have to hesitate and draw back. It must be one of the most disgustingly hypocritical systems in the world.
Except for Canefield and the kindness of our hostess, it was without a pang that we flew away to Trinidad.
On Trinidad. Drawing a comparison between Barbados and Trinidad is almost irresistible, and it is a contrast which, in spite of the beautiful churches and houses of Barbados and of the gracelessness and the sodden climate of Port of Spain, Trinidad, for me, wins hands down. Trinidadians are free of the characteristics which, among the Barbadians, impair the quiet beauty of the coral island; and whatever the colour feeling in Trinidad may be, it does not fly at you the moment you arrive and lodge in your gullet forever. The Trinidadians appear, by contrast, fantastically carefree and cheerful and definite, and the dominating attribute of the islanders, both black and white, is certainly their vitality.
On Haiti. Smart life in Haiti–the dazzling white tropical suits, the dark heads and hands–resembles a photographic negative. Cabane Choucoune, the fashionable nightclub of Port-au-Prince, is perched on the mountainside above the capital in the cool suburbs of Petionville. It is a replica of an African kraal, a great cylinder of bamboo with a steep conical roof which simultaneously achieves, by skill twist of sophistication, the amenities, the low lights and the luxury of an expensive night club with the atmosphere of the dwelling of an equatorial monarch.
Men in beautifully made white suits and dinner jackets danced with women dressed in the height of fashion. They were superb, far the best-looking we had seen in any of the islands: tall, broad-shouldered, narrow-waisted and long-legged, with a fine carriage of the head and great elegance of movement and gesture. What a relief to see this colour and splendour and extravagance after the shapeless dresses of the colonies! Many of our neighbours were pale in complexion, but the majority were of an imposing ebony. A woman sitting at the next table was perhaps the most beautiful in a room full of sable Venuses.
Fermor reserves the most space for Haiti--three chapters in all--and takes a deep dive into the country's Voodoo rituals, spending multiple nights at ceremonies. He distinguishes between the bush medicine applications of the religion and its rarer but more sensationalized accounts of evil spells or sorcerers which have only grown more infamous in pop culture since this account was published. My takeaway is that there's something special in Haiti--beyond the white man's fascination with Voodoo--that resort loclaes like Jamaica, Aruba or the Cayman Islands do not offer and the media, reporting on natural disasters, do not capture.
Recommended for those, like me, looking for a well-written and researched anthropological journey through the Caribbean.
July 9, 2016
Ever since falling hard for A Time of Gifts last year, I've been working my way through the rest of Patrick Leigh Fermor's oeuvre, but I had some trepidation about this one: it's his first book, written in the late 1940s, and it's about a journey through the (at the time, still colonial) Caribbean. There just seemed to be a lot of potential pitfalls. And that trepidation was warranted; there are a lot of bits in this book that make for uncomfortable reading.
Leigh Fermor is no jingoistic imperialist; he's repulsed by the overt racism he encounters among white locals, seeks to speak with black and Native people on their own terms and to learn about their cultures, is admiring of Aimé Cesaire and empathizes with the Haitian revolution. But at the same time he has a constant tendency to exoticize and generalize about the non-white people he meets, at times in quite racialized ways; there's an element of patronization here that is notably different from his books about Europe. Not surprising, perhaps, in a white European man visiting the Caribbean in the 1940s, but disappointing and upsetting nonetheless.
A big part of what makes Leigh Fermor so compelling in his chronicles of Europe is his historical sensibility--his awareness of the many layers of the past and how they all bleed into and affect one another, and linger into the present--combined with his celebration of multiplicity and cultural mingling, and his equal-opportunity curiosity that encompasses peasants and emperors alike. He has a fascination with the romantic, a tendency to drift into fantasias, but he's able to connect with the romances and dreams of many different peoples and places. In The Traveller's Tree we see that sensibility at play, but also its limits. But I'm glad I read it, for a couple of reasons. This is a vivid and fascinating book, full of delightful turns of phrase and evocative descriptions, that offers a glimpse of the Caribbean at a particular time in the past. It's also salutary to be aware of the flaws and failings of a favorite author. In many ways, the problems with Leigh Fermor's perspective here are still the problems of white liberalism today.
In the end, The Traveller's Tree left me feeling replete with a rich and varied journey - and in dire need of some writing by black Caribbean authors.
Leigh Fermor is no jingoistic imperialist; he's repulsed by the overt racism he encounters among white locals, seeks to speak with black and Native people on their own terms and to learn about their cultures, is admiring of Aimé Cesaire and empathizes with the Haitian revolution. But at the same time he has a constant tendency to exoticize and generalize about the non-white people he meets, at times in quite racialized ways; there's an element of patronization here that is notably different from his books about Europe. Not surprising, perhaps, in a white European man visiting the Caribbean in the 1940s, but disappointing and upsetting nonetheless.
A big part of what makes Leigh Fermor so compelling in his chronicles of Europe is his historical sensibility--his awareness of the many layers of the past and how they all bleed into and affect one another, and linger into the present--combined with his celebration of multiplicity and cultural mingling, and his equal-opportunity curiosity that encompasses peasants and emperors alike. He has a fascination with the romantic, a tendency to drift into fantasias, but he's able to connect with the romances and dreams of many different peoples and places. In The Traveller's Tree we see that sensibility at play, but also its limits. But I'm glad I read it, for a couple of reasons. This is a vivid and fascinating book, full of delightful turns of phrase and evocative descriptions, that offers a glimpse of the Caribbean at a particular time in the past. It's also salutary to be aware of the flaws and failings of a favorite author. In many ways, the problems with Leigh Fermor's perspective here are still the problems of white liberalism today.
In the end, The Traveller's Tree left me feeling replete with a rich and varied journey - and in dire need of some writing by black Caribbean authors.
January 22, 2023
Now that Amazon has stripped itself and Good Reads of the ready ability to review the actual edition you read, I will have to tell you that mine is an out of print , sparsely and by hand illustrated , 2005 paperback edition of Patrick Fermor’s 1950 travel book, The Traveler’s Tree: A Journey Through the Caribbean Islands. Ok, glad that is done.
This is my 5th Patrick book , it was, intentionally or not the research for his one novel, The Violins of Saint-Jacques. I was a little disappointed in the novel and even less a fan of this book. In 420 pages he visits about 15 of the Islands of the Caribbean. The heavily industrialization of rubber stamp 21st century tourism had not yet made of each location, the place where the locals dwell sometimes forcibly separated from the machine that turns out tans, daiquiris and Asian made ten million alike tourist sh---- plastic stuff.
That said almost his first words describe vivid colors, but a lot of dark and black shapes and lines. The weather is hot and he transmits a feeling of doubt and disappointment. Food will usually disappoint, there is too much rum and while he never seems to be positive towards America he makes of himself one of the early resenters of the omnipresents of Coca-Cola.
This book was written well before he was able to reconstruct his earlier travels across pre WWI Europe. In the trilogy that would flow from A Time for Gifts. There, he was able to remember the youthful innocence that allow his much younger self to be in a continuous state of wonder and gratitude. Readers would come to share his scholarship and deep interest in people, buildings and events historical that was part of a stream of shared learning and the pleasures to be had in learning.
In Traveler’s Tree every place had to be tested against its colonial history, relative scaring from their common roots as slave holding islands and the degree to which things not built by the combination of poverty and the rarely mentioned inevitability of violent hurricanes fail to inspire romance. Maybe the islands needed industrial tourism…another depressing thought
No island is populated by a people, all islanders are segmented, incidentally by class, but inevitably by race. It maybe that this is the proper, and objective truth for these places and one more than suspects it is still true. Race and slavery drove the history, including the violent history of these islands, and any failure to report and analyze these facts would be, at best ,less than the truth. Still the case he makes for place after place is that it could only be a paradise for sociologists.
For me the best parts are when he views the local practice of voodoo. He reports as a journalist, absent any judgement. This is Voodoo as practiced before it became a television or movie troupe. If you take this to mean he was indulging in numerous, post pagan orgies, then please turn off the TV. His appreciation of Voodoo is that it is a slave constructed amalgam of barely remembered ceremonies from several part of Africa, cobbled together with elements from whatever religions the slaves found on the islands and had shoved upon them by slave masters. It has no incomplete theology and most satisfying to its believers it lacks a formal or complete structure. Hence, he could discern Latin, Hebrew words along with appeals to catholic saints and historic island figures. Believers did experience spiritual possession by identifiable gods called Iwa , but not sexual abandon. To close the thought; overnight revels ended by attending Catholic Mass.
Often, I was frustrated with The Traveler’s Tree. I am glad I finished. Unlike any other Fermor book, it did not leave me wanting to read more. In fairness, his reporting reads as legitimate as does his scholarship. The scars of colonialism, included the near and sometimes total death of the original population is a matter of history. In every island there was at minimum the bitter after effects of slavery. Fermor could have had no duty to sugar coat these truths. Still, it was rare to find him comfortable with the many kinds of people he would learn from and enjoy in his walk across Europe.
This is my 5th Patrick book , it was, intentionally or not the research for his one novel, The Violins of Saint-Jacques. I was a little disappointed in the novel and even less a fan of this book. In 420 pages he visits about 15 of the Islands of the Caribbean. The heavily industrialization of rubber stamp 21st century tourism had not yet made of each location, the place where the locals dwell sometimes forcibly separated from the machine that turns out tans, daiquiris and Asian made ten million alike tourist sh---- plastic stuff.
That said almost his first words describe vivid colors, but a lot of dark and black shapes and lines. The weather is hot and he transmits a feeling of doubt and disappointment. Food will usually disappoint, there is too much rum and while he never seems to be positive towards America he makes of himself one of the early resenters of the omnipresents of Coca-Cola.
This book was written well before he was able to reconstruct his earlier travels across pre WWI Europe. In the trilogy that would flow from A Time for Gifts. There, he was able to remember the youthful innocence that allow his much younger self to be in a continuous state of wonder and gratitude. Readers would come to share his scholarship and deep interest in people, buildings and events historical that was part of a stream of shared learning and the pleasures to be had in learning.
In Traveler’s Tree every place had to be tested against its colonial history, relative scaring from their common roots as slave holding islands and the degree to which things not built by the combination of poverty and the rarely mentioned inevitability of violent hurricanes fail to inspire romance. Maybe the islands needed industrial tourism…another depressing thought
No island is populated by a people, all islanders are segmented, incidentally by class, but inevitably by race. It maybe that this is the proper, and objective truth for these places and one more than suspects it is still true. Race and slavery drove the history, including the violent history of these islands, and any failure to report and analyze these facts would be, at best ,less than the truth. Still the case he makes for place after place is that it could only be a paradise for sociologists.
For me the best parts are when he views the local practice of voodoo. He reports as a journalist, absent any judgement. This is Voodoo as practiced before it became a television or movie troupe. If you take this to mean he was indulging in numerous, post pagan orgies, then please turn off the TV. His appreciation of Voodoo is that it is a slave constructed amalgam of barely remembered ceremonies from several part of Africa, cobbled together with elements from whatever religions the slaves found on the islands and had shoved upon them by slave masters. It has no incomplete theology and most satisfying to its believers it lacks a formal or complete structure. Hence, he could discern Latin, Hebrew words along with appeals to catholic saints and historic island figures. Believers did experience spiritual possession by identifiable gods called Iwa , but not sexual abandon. To close the thought; overnight revels ended by attending Catholic Mass.
Often, I was frustrated with The Traveler’s Tree. I am glad I finished. Unlike any other Fermor book, it did not leave me wanting to read more. In fairness, his reporting reads as legitimate as does his scholarship. The scars of colonialism, included the near and sometimes total death of the original population is a matter of history. In every island there was at minimum the bitter after effects of slavery. Fermor could have had no duty to sugar coat these truths. Still, it was rare to find him comfortable with the many kinds of people he would learn from and enjoy in his walk across Europe.
January 20, 2013
The idea of "travel writing" is, like the term "war poetry", a conceit. A useful conceit, to be sure, but a conceit nonetheless. So to call Paddy Leigh Fermor - man of action, scholar, lover, wit, soldier - a travel writer has the baleful effect of reducing the shimmering depth and breadth of his work to a shorthand. Like his other books, The Traveller's Tree, which recounts his 1949 journey around the Caribbean islands, made with Joan Eyres-Monsell (who would become his wife in 1968) and the Greek photographer A Costa, is not essentially a travel book. It is a book about people, places, beliefs, curiosities and, above all, about ideas.
But what a vision it is.
Whether encountering the sulphurous air of Martinique's volcanoes, Haitian voodoo rites dripping with Catholic symbolism, or the Protestant version in Jamaica, and ending with a remarkable vision of Chinese mythology in the midst of Havana's carnival, Leigh Fermor's extraordinary understanding and erudition never fails him.
His forte is language, the cultural underpinnings of religion and an uncanny genius at minute description. So whether as a first dip into the writings of this extraordinary man, or as an adjunct to works like A Time of Gifts or Between The Woods and the Water, this book will intrigue, surprise and delight.
But what a vision it is.
Whether encountering the sulphurous air of Martinique's volcanoes, Haitian voodoo rites dripping with Catholic symbolism, or the Protestant version in Jamaica, and ending with a remarkable vision of Chinese mythology in the midst of Havana's carnival, Leigh Fermor's extraordinary understanding and erudition never fails him.
His forte is language, the cultural underpinnings of religion and an uncanny genius at minute description. So whether as a first dip into the writings of this extraordinary man, or as an adjunct to works like A Time of Gifts or Between The Woods and the Water, this book will intrigue, surprise and delight.
Read
December 8, 2021So it turns out that Patrick Leigh Fermor can be just as witty and erudite when he writes about the Caribbean as he can about the European lands steeped in ancient history he's better known for documenting. The Travellers' Tree is one of those rare documents showing an honest love for a part of the world then regarded, and to a certain extent still regarded, as backward. He marvels over the history, gastronomy, sartorial style, and architecture of the region, is horrified by the obnoxious and fussy Englishness he encounters on certain islands, is thoroughly weirded out by the Rastas he meets in Jamaica and strangely admiring of the vodoun practitioners of Haiti. Really, just a tour de force.
July 28, 2011
This was very interesting, learned a lot about the Caribbean and the history of some of the islands. Enjoyed it but it was not a quick read for me.
July 2, 2013
I began reading this travellers' survey of the Caribbean islands because it was mentioned in Live and Let Die as required reading for James Bond on voodoo.
The voodoo-covering chapters on Haiti are probably the most narrative-driven of the whole selection, but they're not as serious as coverage by someone like Alfred Metraux or Maya Deren. That's OK, though, as Fermor's now much-dated quaintness adds a touch of old-world observation to the proceedings that's not entirely unpleasant.
This book is great as a snapshot of a much-changed area. Some of the notes on racism - either in the islands or inherent in some of the author's comments - date it very badly, but the work fulfils that of great travel writing; it makes you want to see these places with your own eyes.
The voodoo-covering chapters on Haiti are probably the most narrative-driven of the whole selection, but they're not as serious as coverage by someone like Alfred Metraux or Maya Deren. That's OK, though, as Fermor's now much-dated quaintness adds a touch of old-world observation to the proceedings that's not entirely unpleasant.
This book is great as a snapshot of a much-changed area. Some of the notes on racism - either in the islands or inherent in some of the author's comments - date it very badly, but the work fulfils that of great travel writing; it makes you want to see these places with your own eyes.
October 2, 2018
A present from a similarly geeky friend, since Ian Fleming quotes extensively from the Haiti section in Live and Let Die. There's also a brief reference to Fleming's house on Jamaica, and probably the inspiration for Doctor No's marching land crabs.
All this aside, it was a fascinating read with a great deal of humour as well as writing that was beautifully descriptive without being too flowery.
It was also highly educational; spotting a bottle of 'Red Leg' rum in the supermarket the other day, I was able to feel all superior because I knew who the Red Legs were.
All this aside, it was a fascinating read with a great deal of humour as well as writing that was beautifully descriptive without being too flowery.
It was also highly educational; spotting a bottle of 'Red Leg' rum in the supermarket the other day, I was able to feel all superior because I knew who the Red Legs were.
January 7, 2020
Eesh, I know that Patrick Leigh Fermor is often held up as one of the best travel writers ever, but there are a lot of cringe-worthy moment in this book. It is odd that the jacket copy doesn't use the word "race" in their synopsis as much of how Leigh Fermor understands the islands he visits is through the lens of race. Given their histories, this isn't surprising—along with the English and French fighting over the islands that he mostly focuses on over the centuries, much of their histories are shaped mostly by tensions between slaves (and later free blacks), a plantation class, and poorer whites.
Also considering the era when Leigh Fermor wrote this book (in the late 1940s), perhaps his views of the black residents of the islands aren't surprising. There many passages that mention the Afro-Caribbeans' love of music and colorful, shiny objects and an uncomfortable number that dwell on the beauty of their big, strong black bodies. Many of the black residents he encounters quickly become simply "the Negro" or "the Negroes." When he muses on what Haitian soldiers would look like if they were shirtless and armed like African tribesmen, the distance between Leigh Fermor and how contemporary writers would address his subject is uncomfortably inescapable. And there are many moments like that.
Most of the book focuses on the Lesser Antilles, the chain of islands including Guadeloupe, Martinique, St. Lucia, Dominica, and others stretching from the South American mainland up to Puerto Rico. He does spend a fair amount of time in Haiti, however, and there he seems to have an odd fixation with voodoo—given the rest of the book, it somehow doesn't seem surprising that he is so focused on one of the aspects of Haiti that is frequently so sensationalized.
The book is still engaging as a view of the Caribbean islands towards the end of colonial rule for many of them and during a time when travel in the region had hardships that are hard to imagine now when so many are just a quick flight from the U.S. on JetBlue or American. And it is also fascinating to read an Englishman from the 1940s writing about race, if only to be made aware of the huge distance between his perspective and today's.
It is probably not the best volume to pick up, however, if you are simply in search of a good overview of the cultures and histories of the islands of the Caribbean. I'm going to continue on and read Leigh Fermor's later books about Europe, and especially Greece, however. Maybe then it will be easier to enjoy what he does well—painting scenes and intertwining history with a first-person travel narrative.
Also considering the era when Leigh Fermor wrote this book (in the late 1940s), perhaps his views of the black residents of the islands aren't surprising. There many passages that mention the Afro-Caribbeans' love of music and colorful, shiny objects and an uncomfortable number that dwell on the beauty of their big, strong black bodies. Many of the black residents he encounters quickly become simply "the Negro" or "the Negroes." When he muses on what Haitian soldiers would look like if they were shirtless and armed like African tribesmen, the distance between Leigh Fermor and how contemporary writers would address his subject is uncomfortably inescapable. And there are many moments like that.
Most of the book focuses on the Lesser Antilles, the chain of islands including Guadeloupe, Martinique, St. Lucia, Dominica, and others stretching from the South American mainland up to Puerto Rico. He does spend a fair amount of time in Haiti, however, and there he seems to have an odd fixation with voodoo—given the rest of the book, it somehow doesn't seem surprising that he is so focused on one of the aspects of Haiti that is frequently so sensationalized.
The book is still engaging as a view of the Caribbean islands towards the end of colonial rule for many of them and during a time when travel in the region had hardships that are hard to imagine now when so many are just a quick flight from the U.S. on JetBlue or American. And it is also fascinating to read an Englishman from the 1940s writing about race, if only to be made aware of the huge distance between his perspective and today's.
It is probably not the best volume to pick up, however, if you are simply in search of a good overview of the cultures and histories of the islands of the Caribbean. I'm going to continue on and read Leigh Fermor's later books about Europe, and especially Greece, however. Maybe then it will be easier to enjoy what he does well—painting scenes and intertwining history with a first-person travel narrative.
April 19, 2022
Patrick Leigh Fermor provides impressions of the Caribbean islands he visited with a certain amount of astuteness, given the era in which he was writing (the reader needs to be mindful of this when encountering uncomfortable moments in the book), and bearing in mind he was an 'outsider'. The consequences of slavery are not glossed over and we are given details of how the enslaved fought back. I liked the historical anecdotes and references to past writers, as well as the insights into the creative arts that he saw on his travels. This is not a book for the squeamish, as there are some long descriptions of voodoo and the rites of some cults, as well as some descriptions of war, torture and stories of cannibalism. In the mix though we are provided also with descriptions of architecture, clothing, nature, bathing, food and drink. It does seem that Patrick Leigh Fermor was generally well-received by all, both rich and poor, old and young - he appears to have disarmed people by his charm and openness to fresh experiences.
April 18, 2011
Good overview of the author's travels in the region just after World War II - long enough ago that the references seem historical, rather than dated. Although he went to Cuba, Fermor says it wasn't included due to not being able to communicate with natives for the language barrier; he does mention Puerto Rico briefly. Haiti is covered in great detail as the penultimate location; the rather drawn out discussion of voudou pretty much ended my interest in the book, so the reasonably brief final chapter on Jamaica got pretty much lost as a result.
Glad I read it, though a bit of a haul (as opposed to a slog) to get through, with lots of details of colonial history!
Glad I read it, though a bit of a haul (as opposed to a slog) to get through, with lots of details of colonial history!
January 21, 2011
I'm delighted to see this classic being republished. Whether sampling sour-sop fruit in the market, attending unusual religious ceremonies, visiting the lepers of Chacachacare, or describing the breeze-catching windows of Ian Fleming's house overlooking the sea in Jamaica, Fermor demonstrates a remarkable gift for getting into the cultures he visits, and taking us--the readers--along with him. Much of what he records has probably altered or vanished, but we can still visit these islands' recent past by reading The Traveller's Tree. And by re-reading it. The book is that good.
January 3, 2014
Brilliant. The last of the old world travelers, capturing the foment between a sumptuously violent past and precarious future of cultural free-for all. Not for the impatient of snobbish, polyglot vocabulary. But then again, he's always right in the money, and if there's the right word for something, why not use it?
May 6, 2011
3.5 stars, if it were possible. Written in the later forties, this is not at all Fermor's best work, but it's still wonderful, full of weird observations, with hints here and there of the wizardish prose he manages in later books.
July 23, 2016
Interesting travel book
Very well written, entertaining and still relevant for today's traveler. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it even though I have not traveled through the Carribean.
Very well written, entertaining and still relevant for today's traveler. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it even though I have not traveled through the Carribean.
March 6, 2019
I really liked this book. While there seems to be a Leigh Fermor revival in England at the moment, I had thought it might reflect a desire on the part of the victims of Brexit to be anywhere else. But, no, this man is an acute observer with a broad cultural span of reference. He wrote beautifully.
This trip, perhaps a well-earned holiday after his WWII activities, occurred in the late '40s. As it is presented in the NYRB edition, the text, except for an envoi, follows an introduction by the author of Island People, Joshua Jelly-Schapiro, while, after, follow photographs by A. C0sta, one of the two travelers with Fermor. A Map with an infinitesimally named sequence of the Lesser Antilles in an inset, precedes the title page.
The trip began in the middle of these "lesser" islands, on Guadeloupe (2 ch.), Martinique (2), Dominica, Barbados, and Trinidad (1 @) as they moved southwest, the started back northeastward from Grenada,St Lucia, Antigua, St Kitts (1), St Eustatius, Saba, St Martin, St Thomas (1), Haiti (3), and Jamaica (1). Cuba provides grist for the envoi.
"Pere Labat is the best of the writers on the background of this book, in any language; and, as his travels took him to a number of the Spanish or English islands, he is almost as rewarding a source on these as on his own French ones. I have introduced this ribald, perceptive monk at some length as his name, like the robust shoots of a tropical creeper, will appear many times am0ng the branches of this traveler's tree" (pp 82-83, italics mine). One can see here the intertwining of the literary and the scene, a trademark of Fermor's writing, examples of which abound in the text.
In such a place as this, one could easily go overboard in exemplification; I shall pass on to note that, while he gave short shrift to the Rastafarians of Jamaica, he spent nearly 40 pages on voodoo and wanga. His observations on racial matters set him outside the typical English pale of class and wogs, suggesting possibilities of overcoming the tensions in leaving the past in the past, something the United States might profit from not merely learning but practicing.
I cannot quote lengthy passages to support this assertion, but Fermor's powers of description actually place the reader at the scene, eliminating all distraction and maintaining an exceptionally detailed focus.
My interest is formed by frequent jaunts to the Caribbean--Jamaica, St John (unmentioned here)--and in-laws who have a home in Nevis; here, my curiosity about Fermor led me on.
I am grateful to have several more of his volumes in my library.
This trip, perhaps a well-earned holiday after his WWII activities, occurred in the late '40s. As it is presented in the NYRB edition, the text, except for an envoi, follows an introduction by the author of Island People, Joshua Jelly-Schapiro, while, after, follow photographs by A. C0sta, one of the two travelers with Fermor. A Map with an infinitesimally named sequence of the Lesser Antilles in an inset, precedes the title page.
The trip began in the middle of these "lesser" islands, on Guadeloupe (2 ch.), Martinique (2), Dominica, Barbados, and Trinidad (1 @) as they moved southwest, the started back northeastward from Grenada,St Lucia, Antigua, St Kitts (1), St Eustatius, Saba, St Martin, St Thomas (1), Haiti (3), and Jamaica (1). Cuba provides grist for the envoi.
"Pere Labat is the best of the writers on the background of this book, in any language; and, as his travels took him to a number of the Spanish or English islands, he is almost as rewarding a source on these as on his own French ones. I have introduced this ribald, perceptive monk at some length as his name, like the robust shoots of a tropical creeper, will appear many times am0ng the branches of this traveler's tree" (pp 82-83, italics mine). One can see here the intertwining of the literary and the scene, a trademark of Fermor's writing, examples of which abound in the text.
In such a place as this, one could easily go overboard in exemplification; I shall pass on to note that, while he gave short shrift to the Rastafarians of Jamaica, he spent nearly 40 pages on voodoo and wanga. His observations on racial matters set him outside the typical English pale of class and wogs, suggesting possibilities of overcoming the tensions in leaving the past in the past, something the United States might profit from not merely learning but practicing.
I cannot quote lengthy passages to support this assertion, but Fermor's powers of description actually place the reader at the scene, eliminating all distraction and maintaining an exceptionally detailed focus.
My interest is formed by frequent jaunts to the Caribbean--Jamaica, St John (unmentioned here)--and in-laws who have a home in Nevis; here, my curiosity about Fermor led me on.
I am grateful to have several more of his volumes in my library.
January 6, 2021
I have now read all six of Leigh Fermor's major works. The walk to Constantinople trilogy is the easiest entry point, generating a wistful ennui at the world that was and was about to be destroyed in a maelstrom of violence.
The two Greek works are a significant step higher in terms of erudition, ethnological, architectural and historical rigour as they portray Greece beyond the classics.
This work sits alone between the two. Leigh Fermor's travels through the Caribbean in 1948-49, combines humourous and enlightening encounters with local cultures and people, as well as snippets of the history from colonial times on, and the occasional slippage into Pevsnerian architectural description. Warm writing perfectly time to bask in amidst the gloom and cold of an English lockdown winter. Although this was his first major book it is written with the eagerness of a writer wanting to make his mark in the world.
The introduction notes chapters on Puerto Rico, Cuba and Santo Domingo were omitted since they were mainly architectural due to Leigh Fermor's lack of facility with Spanish. It would be wonderful if his literary executors could track them down and publish them! After the trip Leigh Fermor went on to travel in South America but nothing ever emerged in public from his pen of his time there. Sadly another casualty of his slowness at writing which means his overall output is rather slim given the abilities he had.
But read this work for its sweep of the Caribbean in one book, views on ethnic tensions which varied from island to island, the theology of Voodooism, lepers of Trinidad and jolly Jamaican Maroons. And you will never eat at a bad restaurant again without thinking of Leigh Fermor's quip that menus in such places should be accompanied by a stretcher!
The two Greek works are a significant step higher in terms of erudition, ethnological, architectural and historical rigour as they portray Greece beyond the classics.
This work sits alone between the two. Leigh Fermor's travels through the Caribbean in 1948-49, combines humourous and enlightening encounters with local cultures and people, as well as snippets of the history from colonial times on, and the occasional slippage into Pevsnerian architectural description. Warm writing perfectly time to bask in amidst the gloom and cold of an English lockdown winter. Although this was his first major book it is written with the eagerness of a writer wanting to make his mark in the world.
The introduction notes chapters on Puerto Rico, Cuba and Santo Domingo were omitted since they were mainly architectural due to Leigh Fermor's lack of facility with Spanish. It would be wonderful if his literary executors could track them down and publish them! After the trip Leigh Fermor went on to travel in South America but nothing ever emerged in public from his pen of his time there. Sadly another casualty of his slowness at writing which means his overall output is rather slim given the abilities he had.
But read this work for its sweep of the Caribbean in one book, views on ethnic tensions which varied from island to island, the theology of Voodooism, lepers of Trinidad and jolly Jamaican Maroons. And you will never eat at a bad restaurant again without thinking of Leigh Fermor's quip that menus in such places should be accompanied by a stretcher!
October 24, 2017
In October 1947, having successfully pitched an idea to publisher John (Jock) Murray, Patrick Leigh Fermor arrived in Pointe-a-Pitre, Guadeloupe, accompanied by photographer Costa Achillopoulos, and Joan Rayner, who Paddy had met in Cairo during the War and who many years later became his wife; Paddy's brief, to write a travelogue which would explore the Francophone and Anglophone islands of the Caribbean. The result launched the career of arguably the greatest travel writer of the twentieth century.
The book is a book very much to be savored, as Paddy pursues his enthusiasms throughout the islands. Always game, and always sympathetic to the people he encounters, the whole thing can become wonderfully discursive, and frequently loses momentum as Paddy explores various blind alleys of history and art.
"...my neighbour, who had buttoned his fighting-cock into the bosom of his shirt so that only its hateful little cropped head appeared, began to discourse of religion. He had repudiated Voodoo, he said, and along with it (as though is was a subdivision of Voodoo), Catholicism. All that idolatry! The Lwas, the saints, the Virgin Mary, Jesus Christ, he'd finished with all that. 'I only believe in the Old Testament,' he surprisingly went on; all the rest was rubbish. He was, he maintained, a convert to Wesleyan Methodism. 'No more idols!' he said, and fell asleep. An empty rum bottle fell from his lap and rolled about the floor. The head of the cock, oscillating with the jolts of the bus, fixed me with a severe and bloodshot eye, which plainly stated that the same sentiments went for him too. The sun set, and a mood of depression, closely resembling despair, overcame me."
The book is a book very much to be savored, as Paddy pursues his enthusiasms throughout the islands. Always game, and always sympathetic to the people he encounters, the whole thing can become wonderfully discursive, and frequently loses momentum as Paddy explores various blind alleys of history and art.
"...my neighbour, who had buttoned his fighting-cock into the bosom of his shirt so that only its hateful little cropped head appeared, began to discourse of religion. He had repudiated Voodoo, he said, and along with it (as though is was a subdivision of Voodoo), Catholicism. All that idolatry! The Lwas, the saints, the Virgin Mary, Jesus Christ, he'd finished with all that. 'I only believe in the Old Testament,' he surprisingly went on; all the rest was rubbish. He was, he maintained, a convert to Wesleyan Methodism. 'No more idols!' he said, and fell asleep. An empty rum bottle fell from his lap and rolled about the floor. The head of the cock, oscillating with the jolts of the bus, fixed me with a severe and bloodshot eye, which plainly stated that the same sentiments went for him too. The sun set, and a mood of depression, closely resembling despair, overcame me."
January 28, 2018
I am a huge fan of Fermor, especially his 2 and a half books about his walking trip across Europe before the war. They contain some of the best travel writing anywhere, ever. The Traveller's Tree was written after WWII, when Fermor took his wife and a photographer to the Caribbean, and tried to do for that part of the world what he did for Europe and the Greeks. It won awards at the time and established Fermor as the travel writer of his generation.
Sadly, the book has dated horribly. It's racist by our standards, and you can't read it as a citizen of the 21st century without cringing. And while Fermor still can write so beautifully of landscape that you want to jump on a plane and go see the place, he writes about the blacks in the Caribbean as exotic Others, not fully human, and even, in a few icky places, with a kind of sex-tourist thing going on. It's no longer tenable.
He does get the politics of the waning days of colonialism right, but his understanding is directed toward the English and the French, not the citizens of the Caribbean. Pass this one, like the era, by.
Sadly, the book has dated horribly. It's racist by our standards, and you can't read it as a citizen of the 21st century without cringing. And while Fermor still can write so beautifully of landscape that you want to jump on a plane and go see the place, he writes about the blacks in the Caribbean as exotic Others, not fully human, and even, in a few icky places, with a kind of sex-tourist thing going on. It's no longer tenable.
He does get the politics of the waning days of colonialism right, but his understanding is directed toward the English and the French, not the citizens of the Caribbean. Pass this one, like the era, by.
July 28, 2019
A book that was written in 1950 is always going to use words that feel wrong today. There are expressions that jar to a modern readers sensibilities. That aside this is a book that gives you the feel of the Caribbean Islands. Patrick Leigh Fermor writes beautifully about the trips around the islands. Of course he can't resist putting a discussion of history into his travel bools so you get a history book as well as a travelogue.
I've read nearly all of Patrick Leigh Fermor books and this is of the same quality, with the same enthusiasm bubbling through the prose, as the others. Some might find his prose a bit too flowery and he makes an assumption of a reasonable knowledge of French to get through some of the passages.
I'd be surprised if this was how the islands are now, but it's a lovely view of how things used to be.
I've read nearly all of Patrick Leigh Fermor books and this is of the same quality, with the same enthusiasm bubbling through the prose, as the others. Some might find his prose a bit too flowery and he makes an assumption of a reasonable knowledge of French to get through some of the passages.
I'd be surprised if this was how the islands are now, but it's a lovely view of how things used to be.
Read
July 13, 2020Having lived and worked in the Caribbean and hearing Fermor was a wonderful travel writer I was attracted to read his book. I must say I was disappointed at my lack of ability to relate to his incredibly detailed descriptions. Granted I was in 'the north' in the Virgin Islands and his is set in the Antilles, I just couldn't see what he saw. Perhaps too much history for my liking, although also the intervening years between 'my' time in the late 70's and his in the 50's? I shouldn't be so critical and will try again but didn't find it an 'easy read'
November 6, 2017
Having read Fermor's three books on his trek across Europe as a young man and then his two volumes on Greece, I naturally thought this book would be of the same caliber. It is not. His writing isn't nearly as purple or twisty here as it is in his later writings. His tangents aren't as neatly developed. His travel companions are occasionally mentioned but are completely undeveloped. The section on Haiti, late in the book, finally shows him gaining his footing, but it's too little too late.
October 10, 2023
My husband read this to me. Unfortunately, we did not love the book - the author is not a great travel writer, he sorely needed a good editor, and the quality of covering the different islands was very inconsistent. Large sections of the first third are in French which did become tedious. That being said, we did learn something new about the Carribean, and the author does have a stunning, unique way of describing natural beauty (when he is not lost in digressions).
April 11, 2022
I got this book because I was reading John Houston's autobiography and this was his favorite book. I can understand why he'd like this book. It contains the detail that a film director would like when shooting a film. It was a little difficult reading at times because of all the details involved. There were times when I had to put the book down for a day or two to digest all the details.
February 23, 2024
An uneven book which could have used more editing: some parts too long and others too abrupt. I love the author, but this book is definitely much lower on my list of his books. Still pretty enjoyable.
January 24, 2018
A bit of a cheat re: my reading challenge as I started this a couple years ago. I prefer (love) Fermor‘s trilogy about walking across Europe, but this is very enjoyable.
November 5, 2019
Ponderous, more encyclopaedia than travelogue,
June 15, 2020
Joy
Sheer joy and pleasure reading Paddys first book! A master.It has inspired me to read and learn more about the Caribbean
Sheer joy and pleasure reading Paddys first book! A master.It has inspired me to read and learn more about the Caribbean
August 22, 2021
If you can get past the squicky exoticism, really interesting.
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