Robert Byron needs an ereader!
Quote:
I wish I were rich enough to endow a prize for the sensible traveller: £10,000 for the first man to cover Marco Polo's outward route reading three fresh books a week, and another £10,000 if he drinks a bottle of wine a day as well. That man might tell one something about the journey. He might or might not be naturally observant. But at least he would use what else he had, and would not think it necessary to dress up the result in thrills that never happened and science no deeper than his own jargon.
What I mean is, that if I had some more detective stories instead of Thucydides and some bottles of claret instead of tepid whiskey, I should probably settle here for good.
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In seriousness, when you get to the latter passages in the book, I've found interesting the contrast between the winter and spring seasons and its effect on one's mental state in addition to the landscape.