Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1094 in Books
• Published on: 1973-05-31
• Format: Illustrated
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 192 pages

Customer Reviews

A forgotten style
A style of writing that we dont see much these days. So much description that you almost feel heady. The warmth of the sun and the total atmosphere of old Spain were almost tangible.
A very relaxed writing by a young man with a zest for life and discovery.
Also a great book for anyone studying the Spanish civil war and the mood of the country beforehand,not from the politician's and historian's point of view,but an ordinary person's.
One of those books I would read again just for the descriptive narrative.

'As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning'
I first read this book in 1970 and just like one reviewer said,'Beware though as this book may make you want to give it all up and set off with your knapsack', well I did just that. In 1973/74 I travelled through 'Laurie Lee's Spain and it was just as I imagined it would be. This book for me evoked the essence of Spain of that time. Lee is an excellent writer, not only of novels but of poetry. I have re-read it many time since and it still evokes those feelings of wanting to go and explore. I'm thankful that I did do just that.

An odd little book
I managed to finish reading this the second time I picked it up. It was a case of putting it to rest, or else, sometime in the future I'd feel compelled to try again - and then, maybe I'd have to start from scratch. And I haven't got the energy to do that again.

While I enjoyed the honeyed recollections of 'Cider with Rosie', 'As I walked..." is by far a more difficult read. For a start it's oddly balanced. Why - I wonder - bother with the time spent travelling to and staying in London, when the pertinent focus of the book is his time spent in Spain? The end is a terrible cliff-hanger, which I suppose would encourage the interested reader to pick up the next installment 'A Moment of War'. Not me, I'm afraid.

In comparison with the rosy recollections of his childhood in Slad, Lee's vision of Spain is on a par with Dante's Hell. Everywhere is in a state of physical decay and moral decline. Throughout his journey he accepts the generosity of impoverished folks across the country, but shows little gratitude or appreciation on the printed page for this quality in the Spanish people. He appears quite dispassionate about what he sees. I find the claim that he mastered a fluency in Spanish after only a short time into his year-long journey, little short of a miracle. I understand there is a controversial idea that Lee did not, in fact, do all that he said he did, which includes his alleged later involvement in fighting Fascists in the Civil War. The growing presence of the impending Civil War arrives too late in the book to save me from boredom. I personally found this book a pompous, self-satisfying bore.