Patrick Leigh Fermor and the Place (or lack of) of the Polymath

A few weeks ago, I decided to delve into a new branch of literature as I picked up the autobiographical travel novel of Patrick Leigh Fermor, A Time of Gifts. As I write this blog entry, I am halfway through the sequel, Between the Woods and the Water, and thoroughly hooked. Written in 1977, A Time of Gifts is the first instalment in a trilogy narrating his journey from Holland to Constantinople, which he embarked upon as a perspicacious 18 year old in 1933. Unsure of what to expect at first, it quickly became apparent that I had fortuitously stumbled upon not only a well-written, fascinating book, but one which is unique. Fermor’s capacity for truly mesmerising descriptions of landscape, and evocative recreation of people and places, combine to produce a piece of writing which does not merely allow the reader to imagine his journey, but to experience it. The narrative saunters along at a leisurely pace like a continental stream meandering through woodland and field, as Fermor’s style reflects his own unhurried approach to this adventure; as he did not rush through the Great Hungarian Plain and along the Danube’s tributary paths, so too does he not wish for the reader to hasten through his work. At times, the plethora of historic detail which accompanies explanations of visited regions threatens to make your head hang in despairing ignorance, but I think that this also is a deliberate device of Fermor. As one who passed through adolescence in the shelter of an English boarding school, many of the places along the way will have been completely alien to him, and so the author ingeniously replicates this feeling by sharing the concomitant, esoteric details of the journey. A Time of Gifts discourages the parochial and impatient reader, but if one comes along with an inquisitive and imaginative mind, they will find the work of Patrick Leigh Fermor as enlightening, inspiring and enjoyable as I do.

"...all trace of the capital and the western hills had vanished .We were in the middle of a limitless space" Patrick Leigh Fermor on the Great Hungarian Plain

This in itself would be enough to convince me on Artemis Cooper’s adulation of Fermor as a ‘travel writer hailed as the best of his time’, but there is another quality which draws me to his writing even more; it exudes an erudition which indicates the hand of an uncontested polymath. His grasp of pre-war European culture, languages, history, society, geography, flora and fauna, and etiquette, as well as an impressive knowledge of Latin and an enviable memory, continue to amaze me as I turn the pages, engrossed in the art of such an admirable man. The radical French political E. Herriot once said ‘la culture, c’est ce qui reste quand on a tout oublié’ (culture is what is left when everything else is forgotten), and nobody advocates the merits of this quotation as strongly as Fermor. As a student of the arts myself, I have been inspired by his his thirst for knowledge and perennial curiosity to take a leaf out of his book and pursue the same level of attentiveness in my own life. Books always resonate strongly in me when their messages remain indelibly imprinted in my mind long after reading the final sentence, and Fermor’s travel novels do just that. The account of a boy (or man, I suppose I should say) embarking upon such an ambitious journey, and showing such an interest in all aspects of every visited country, is even more striking when many 18 year olds of this day and age are preparing to head off to University to spend the proceeding three or four years studying only one subject. Even before this stage, the education system of the modern day encourages very early specialisation, forcing 15 year olds to begin the process of narrowing down their interests. Now, subject choices are to be made with one (or, quite frankly, both) eyes firmly fixed on future career paths, to the point that choosing a variety of arts and sciences is seen as a detrimentally ‘confused’ decision. “What job wants those A Levels?”, “You can’t do Art and Music, that’s too many soft choices.” If I had one pound for every time I heard statements such as these in the past few years, I would have enough to lay aside any money worries and enjoy a trans-European cultural pilgrimage myself!

But the responsibility for endorsing insular minds at such an early stage of life cannot be apportioned to schools, or even the education system. Rather, it is the job market itself which demands extreme specialisation for any chance of aspiring to lofty career-ladder heights. In a capitalist market which demands success and amelioration to cope with the ever-increasing competition across the globe, as long as you are good at the skills required by your job, that is enough. The well-rounded scholar comes second to the computer whizz whose sole fictional experience was reading the last page of Of Mice and Men for GCSE English. Why waste time developing an awareness of the geographical location of each country on the planet, when a 3D Interactive Atlas is two clicks away on Google? Like it or not, this is the reality of today’s epoch: one which has contrived a filter for ‘useful’ and ‘useless’ knowledge and fails to reward those who strive to broaden themselves unless it directly results in improved performance in the work environment. It is one which deters the next Patrick Leigh Fermor, yet paradoxically one which still remembers the distant, immortal names of Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo in awe. The truth is that these polymaths are seen as having led an atavistic, and now unrealistic, lifestyle incompatible with the demands of modernity.

Leonardo da Vinci: painter, sculptor, architect, scientist, musician, mathematician, engineer, inventor, geologist, astrologist, botanist, writer, and historian. The ultimate Renaissance Man

I do not, however, believe that all hope is crushed by the necessities of the age for those who still see the merit in becoming (or, at the least, endeavouring to be) a polymath. In actual fact, I see the real threat as being the influx of other distractions, which tease away the limited free-time which we do have. After a draining day of studying or work, for most people, the enticement of the television, computer or Playstation dwarfs that of the dusty collection of Romantic poetry on the bookshelf or political philosophy article open on page one on the study desk. It’s more accessible. It’s less demanding. It’s easier. It’s not a temptation which da Vinci had to deal with in the fifteenth Century, nor Fermor in the twentieth. It is, however, one which must be overcome in order to achieve the scholarly prowess of a polymath, or a well-rounded individual in general. Choose the book or the instrument. Don’t spend all your time refreshing the twitter timeline. 

So go on, give it a go. Generally, it’s better to approach the day as a Berlin fox than as a hedgehog (The Hedgehog and the Fox). If you need the instigating spark of motivation, pick up a copy of Fermor’s A Time of Gifts. It worked for me and, even if it doesn’t for you, I can guarantee that, at the very least, you will enjoy the read. Strive to self-improve, wield an unquenchable thirst for knowledge and an understanding about the world around us, and broaden your horizons; even if it is something which is wrongfully undervalued in the modern day, the skills which it develops and the discipline required are indubitably going to help in your everyday life. And even if they don’t, it will be thoroughly rewarding all the same, and you will enjoy it.

John Steinbeck, The Traveller and Ford Model Ts

“Highway 66 is the main migrant road. 66 – the long concrete path across the country, waving gently up and down on the map, from the Mississippi to Bakersfield – over the red lands and the gray lands, twisting up into the mountains, crossing the Divide and down into the bright and terrible desert, and across the desert to the mountains again, and into the rich California valleys.”

When I first read Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath seven years ago, I didn’t know what Route 66 was, and I certainly had no idea about the extent of its significance to America’s history in the 20^th Century. Nor did I suspect that, in seven years’ time, I would be en route to Chicago to follow in the footsteps of the Joad family and begin my own adventure down this historic road. Whilst I was, strictly speaking, one of a “people in flight”, I did not “come into 66 from the tributary side roads”, but rather in the luxury of a Boeing 787, replacing the Okie migrant’s Ford Ts, crammed full of his meagre, well-worn worldly possessions with my own Oxford Lads silk shirts and sunglasses. It is remarkable to think that, in the space of 80 years, this road has transformed from a symbol of the “Final Hope”, the last-chance saloon and difference between life and death for over 200,000 migrants during the Great Depression, to one attracting tourists from all over the world, eager to experience the iconic route, famously coined the ‘Mother Road’ by Steinbeck. Yet, although the purpose of the traveller may not stay the same, his presence on Route 66 has and, most likely, always will. The reasons for human travel may be ephemeral, but the urge, need and desire to do so is forever in our nature. Standing on Adams Street at the start of the 2448 mile-long Main Street of America, on the 13^th August 2015, my circumstances could not have been further removed from those of the migrants of the 1930s, but sharing a path with them instilled in me a sense of connection between travellers by helping to bring them, and their plight, to life. Author and avid traveller Robert Louis Stevenson once said that “There are no foreign lands. It is the traveller only who is foreign”, and I think he captures the essence of what my journey across America taught me; your identity is not so much determined by where you are from, or even the times in which you live, but by who you are. Travel provides for us the ability to overcome geographical obstacles and meet others from different walks of life, and for this reason, it is as essential to human nature as communication itself.

Some dwellings in particular along the way feel time-warped. Here is Oatman, an anachronistic reminder of early Route 66 left untroubled by the modern age.

One only has to converse with people who live and work along the route to put this theory to the test. Regardless of which of the eight route-states you are in, the words 'Route 66' are instantly met with warmth, as if its mention were reminding two strangers that they used to be friends. Many a time it paved the way for unexpected kindness, whether in the form of directions, advice or even just a heartfelt “good luck”, and always accompanied by a recognisable shimmer of pride in ‘their road’ and the role they are playing in its preservation and history.  The way that Route 66 creates such a bond between two people, born half a world apart, and brought together only momentarily, summoned to mind the final scene of The Grapes of Wrath, as Rose of Sharon nurses the old stranger as if he were her own child. Even in an environment of rivalry between families desperately struggling for survival, often against one another, Steinbeck articulates the sense of togetherness and unity established by their shared journey, which stems from the same essence of what bonds travellers and the guardians of the road today.

If you squint, it 's almost possible to see a lone, distant Okie truck broken down in the merciless Arizonian mountains. Almost.

Route 66 has not, however, always been the paradigm of free travel. Having successfully navigated six state-border crossings uncontested (or, more accurately, about 15, after getting lost on the New Mexico-Arizona border mountain-pass and spending the best part of an hour flitting between the two), it came as a surprise to be stopped and checked on the final day at the Californian border. I did not think much of this until later, when reading about the darker side of the ‘Golden State’s’ Route 66 history. Steinbeck hints at California’s anti-immigration stance in his novel, but never portrays the reality of the LAPD’s border patrols and lethal measures implemented to deter migrants from attempting to cross a border, which they were fully entitled by federal law to do. Whilst this is not a period of their state’s history which any Californian would be proud of, the continued existence of border control, which surpasses that of all other states along Route 66, indicates an underlying remnant of the state’s isolationist past.

Of course, it cannot be expected of a country, or state, to open themselves up to totally uncontrolled immigration, but the ramifications of California’s policy during the Great Depression were severe. Thousands (the exact number will forever be impossible to calculate) of migrants were murdered by the state’s rogue Police Department, and an estimated 6500 died every year trying to board trains bound for the south-west. In total, of the migrants that did complete their Odyssean journey, only 8% stayed in California for more than a year, as land tenants and business owners worked in cahoots to create a work environment incompatible with the number of new workers available. The effects of such inhospitality, however, extended beyond the consequences for these people; it formed a situation in which the right to travel was denied, or at least restricted, by the circumstances of the individual. State law dictated that only migrants with $100 dollars to their name could be admitted, thus endorsing the power of material belongings to dictate not just the freedom to travel and fulfil human nature, but the ability to survival.

It is a great shame, therefore, that, 80 years later, those in power are threatening to make the exact same mistakes as the Californian authorities of the 1930s. As I am writing, David Cameron has just confirmed the admission of 4,000 more refugees, admittedly having been somewhat browbeaten by the vast and inspiring charitable grass-roots efforts of the British people. Nevertheless, as we all know, this figure is nowhere near enough; in fact, according to Mike Noyes, the head of humanitarian aid at ActionAid, it ‘represents only 0.1% of the total number of Syrian refugees’. In a moment which can be called, without any accusation of melodrama, a catastrophe of humanity, such a brazen denial of the right to travel in order to survive is dispiritingly reminiscent of the Californian attitude towards the Dust Bowl migrants.

I am not for one moment comparing the dangerous voyages across the Mediterranean of these refugees to a meander down Route 66 on a summer holiday, but the principle of the human right to travel and be accepted by the inhabitants of their destination is something which is not transitory, nor should it be up to the discretion of those in power. We must lay aside our concerns about mass immigration leading to a “lost Western culture” (the rationale behind Viktor Orbàn’s initial reluctance to allow refugees through Hungary), future socio-economic issues, and even the argument that those in need in our own country should be our first priority. These are two separate issues, and the serendipity of being born in our privileged nation, at a time of relative prosperity, is no reason to form a callous attitude towards those who are in need of our help, or see them as in any way less deserving of it.

As I see it, this is not just a test of human charity, but of our right to freedom of movement. Route 66 has always been at its prime when it facilitates travel, regardless of the reasons for it. This should be the right of the traveller wherever he is.