Links & notes: 'The Broken Road'

Nearly all the people in this book, as it turns out, were attached to trails of powder which were already invisibly burning, to explode during the next decade and a half, in unhappy endings. --Patrick Leigh Fermor, writing of Europe in 1933-1934 in his memoir The Broken Road

We had our summer travel reading special this month with Patrick Leigh Fermor's memoir The Broken Road: From the Iron Gates to Mount Athos, recapping (in a feat of tremendous memory) the author's 1933-1934 trip at a remove of many decades.

A few links for further exploration:

• The Broken Road is the third book in a trilogy about the trip. Volumes one and two recount the earlier phases of the journey: A Time of Gifts: On Foot to Constantinople: From the Hook of the Holland to the Middle Danube and Between the Woods and the Water: On Foot to Constantinople: From the Middle Danube to the Iron Gates.

• A bit of film trivia: In Before Midnight, the final film in Richard Linklater's Before Sunrise trilogy about Celine and Jesse, Patrick Leigh Fermor's home in Greece was a filming location.

• Patrick Leigh Fermor is a character in Ill Met by Moonlight, a movie based on a daring mission in which he took part during World War II on the island of Crete. (The film was released in the US as Night Ambush.)

• In this Travellers Century episode, travel writer Benedict Allen retraces some of Fermor's footsteps and interviews the author.

• An enthusiast maintains a website devoted to the life, writings, and past doings of Patrick Leigh Fermor, as well as reflections from others who are inspired to reproduce parts of the trip.

This discussion concludes our discussions for the first half of 2022, and we have a fascinating collection to explore during the second half of the year.