After You, Marco Polo by Jean Bowie Shor (1955)

Posted on 2022-10-21 by thelittleman

After You, Marco Polo: From Venice to Peiping across high Asia, an adventurous American couple follows a dangerous trail seven centuries old by Jean Bowie Shor (1955)

It took me over a year to read this book, which is about as long it took Jean Bowie Shor and her husband Franc to travel from Venice to Pakistan on their way to Beijing in an attempt to retrace the footsteps of Marco Polo.

Why did it take me so long to read? Not because the book wasn’t worth reading, but because it was—I loved it and wanted to join them every step of the way on their trek across the Middle East and Asia, but I had way too much else going on to prioritize it. I mean, it’s 67 years old and has been on my bookshelf for at least 10…so there was no big rush it. Instead, I savored.

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Jean Bowie Shor, the Ethnographer

Shor’s writing style kept me going, though, often humorous and with a keen eye for anecdotes as she travels through some very difficult terrain and often with people they can barely trust. It’s a story of high adventure, even if at times it seems mundane, like “Every traveler experiences that.” It’s true: some of the pains, discomforts, excitements, and experiences shared in this book are common to all travelers, but the trip itself was not.

This is why I so love old travelogues! Never again will an American couple travel those dusty roads of Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan in the 1950s and meet the people they met. Never again will those same border guards, drivers, Shahs, or local families exist to welcome this couple in these ways—sometimes hospitable, oftentimes not. This book gives us an outsiders’ glimpse of a very secret world and at how that world accepted foreigners when they first met them!

Books like these are often labeled as “Travel” or “Adventure” but I have a problem with that. Were I the King Librarian, I would begin to categorize them as “Sociology” or better yet “Ethnography,” for no intentional, scientific study offers us such a perfect snapshot of a people group, village, family, or leader as does a travelogue like this (when done well, of course).

This is why I love to read Paul Theroux‘s travel writings about his time in China. It’s a whole different world than what I experienced, and a world we’ll never see again, but a world that’s foundational to my understanding of today’s China. History books won’t give me this. Biographies, autobiographies, and occasionally memoirs can, but with those, you’re often burdened with views from the inside-out, views that miss the subtle oddities that make a culture what it is. Outsiders notice these better than anyone, which is why their books are often more necessary to pinpoint cultural idiosyncrasies (which only insiders can then explain).

A Mild Critique

If I had to critique this book in any way, it’s Shor’s lack of geographic description. She’s so focused on the people and her and Franc’s own experiences that oftentimes you’re not quite sure where she is. Without brief descriptions of the landscape (beautiful or not), the weather (comfortable or not), or the smells and sounds around her, we’re left kind of in the cab of a car lost in conversation while the world passes by unnoticed. I guess I recognized this flaw because the most recent travelogue I’d read was Mongolia by Silvio Micheli (1964), who did an extraordinary job of describing the world through which he traveled.

Some Quotable Passages

There were a number of passages I marked in this book, but I’ll share only a few that I especially enjoyed. Before I do, though, I just want to ask this question: Who the heck is Major Lincoln, “the legendary American spy who supposedly prowled the Middle East” (p.113-115?) He deserves his own book!

Traveling:

A girl traveling in Asia requires good kidneys, a stopped-up nose, and elastic views on modesty. (16)

A lady can’t invite herself to accompany a gentleman on a journey, but a journalist can always try to cover a story. (131)

Specific People / Places:

It was a local custom [in Urumuchi] to attach tiny whistles to the legs of pigeons, so that all day the air was filled with music. (31)

A harassed Iranian official who paid [the loud Russians’] food bill told us: ‘There’s an old Iranian proverb: “Locusts are not fatal, for after the locust eats the grain, the farmer eats the locust.” But one cannot eat a Russian. They are worse than the locusts.’ (110)

Misinformation, freely given, is the rule rather than the exception in the Middle East. (181)

The Afghan thinks like an Oriental. When you are his guest, he tells you what you wish to hear and what will make you happy. (191-192)

Traveling Post-War:

If you haven’t seen the effect of war you cannot understand it. Even those who have seen it forget it quickly, as they forget pain. They prefer to recall leaves in Paris and Wiesbaden rather than numbing days at the front and starving children in ruined villages and bodies piled up like cordwood in concentration camps. (7)

I had never visualized the Holy City as a battleground. The debris was everywhere. (79)

The fact that this account was written in 1955 really puts the time and place of this final image into perspective. A different Jerusalem than we know today!

Conclusion

This was a great book and I’m glad I stuck with it. Shor’s background with National Geographic certainly boosted her ability to emphasize humorous anecdotes and single-serving friends throughout. I have no idea if it’s still in print, so if you’re interested in some historical travel through the Middle East, I highly recommend seeking this one out in your local used bookstore.

©2022 E.T.

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