Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to Al-Madinah and Meccah, Volume One

I confess: Richard F Burton is one of my heroes. In part, it's because much of my life has been spent in his traces, from India, through the Middle East, to Baltimore and the Great Plains. He's simply a fabulous story-teller. Whether he's commenting on the sexual proclivities of the people of a region, their food, clothing, culture or religious practices, he's just fascinating. This book really should not be sold separately from the second volume; they go together. That said, this is an excellent introduction to 19th C. Arabia. It's an Arabia that exists only in the minds of traditionalists--foreign or Arab--but it informs so much of how the Arabs see themselves that it's "must reading." Burton was in his prime when he wrote this, before his misadventures in searching for the source of the Nile. His observations are acute; his writing clear. Make no mistake, Burton was a member of Victorian English society, even if he could laugh at the barriers of class when out of the country. His insights into Arabia, though, cast a very clear reflection of his upbringing, as well as the new sense of anthropological research he adds to the process.

India:Goa, and the Blue Mountains, 1851Scinde,or, The Unhappy Valley, 1851Sindh, and the Races that inhabit the Valley of the Indus, 1852Falconry in the Valley of the Indus, 1852A Complete System of bayonet Exercise, 1853Africa:Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to El-Medinah and Mecca, 1855First Footsteps in Africa: or an exploration of Harar, 1856The Lake Regions of Central Africa: A Picture of Exploration, 1860The Lake Regions of Central Equatorial Africa with Notices of the Lunar Mountains and the sources of the White Nile...1860America:The City of the Saints and across the Rocky Mountains, 1861The Prairie traveler, 1863Misc.:Abeokuta and the Cameroon mountians, 1863Wanderings in West Africa, 1863A Mission to Gelele, King of the Dahomes,... , 1864The Nile Basin, 1864Wit and Wisdom from West Africa, 1865The Guide Book: A Pictorial Pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina, 1865The Highlands of Brazil, 1869Vikram and the Vampires, or Tales of Hindu Devilry, 1870 Letters from the Battlefields of Paraguay, 1870Unexplored Syria, 1872Zanzibar, 1872The Lands of Canzembe, Lacerds's Journey to Cazembe in 1798, 1873The Captivity of Hans Stade of Hesse, 1874Ultima Thule; or, A Summer in Iceland, 1875Etruscan Bologna, 1876A New System of Sword Exercise for Infantry, 1876Two Trips to Gorilla Land, Congo, 1876Scind Revisited: With Notices of the Anglo-Indian Army; Railroads; Past, Present, and Future, 1877The Gold Mines of Midian, 1878The Land of Midian, 1879The Kasidah, 1880Os, Lusiads, 1880Camoens:His Life and His Lusiads, 1881A Glance at the "Passion Play", 1881To the Gold Coast for Gold, 1883Kama Sutra, 1883The Book of the Sword, 1884Perfumed Garden, 18861001 Nights, 1886-1888Iracema, 1886Priapea, 1890Marocco and the Moors, 1891Il Pentamerone, 1893The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catallus, 1894The Jew and the Gypsy, 1898Wanderings in Three Continents, 1901Its my opinion that though he wrote an amazing number of books none of them are really 5 star classics though there are some flawed masterpieces in there. He just wrote too fast to care about polishing his works. As for racism, a charge that could be brought up against all Imperial Englishman, he is no doubt as guilty as his fellows. Not to excuse him for it but though writing within an anglo tradition and to a strictly anglo public he perhaps overstates his own anglo bias just to assure his readers he has not gone native, a charge which would be ruinous to any career, military or literary. I won't try to convince you one way or the other but any man who learns another mans language and his religion and his literature and pays so much mind to him that he can even drink a glass of water using his exact manner is paying that man and his culture some kind of compliment. I won't pretend to understand what exactly Burtons motives were from one moment to the next and one adventure to the next but his relation to all these cultures certainly cannot be reduced to a one word description. Burton is a man of immense learning

It's hard to take Richard Burton seriously nowadays. His sardonic humor and his hilarious deadpan observations about Middle Eastern life sound more like a satire on Victorian attitudes than an actual travel story. And yet, underneath the veneer one sometimes catches a glimpse of sympathy and actual respect for the people he writes about.Under the veneer, too, there is a hard core layer of reality, and a surprising number of his observations are true even today. The thing that gets me is that he was able to pull off the pilgrimage at all! As a sometime traveler and student of languages, I have been in situations where I have tried to pass for a native, and regardless of where you go it is a difficult act to pull off for more than five minutes. How Burton got all the way to Mecca without being stoned to death is beyond me.Which makes it a good adventure story as well as good travel literature. One of the most enjoyable books I have ever read. I recommend it highly.

Here Burton finds Mecca and the long-sought Ka'abah. Along with descriptions of the Badawin of "Al-Hijaz," the "Bedouins" to us who "haunt" the normal caravan routes, Burton describes the people of Mecca and the religious observances and practices of the "Haji's" first appearance (and subsequent appearances) at the Bayt Ullah, the House of God.While Burton keeps his condescension and moral superiority (if not sublimity) in check, he will occasionally weary the reader and try their patience with such observations as "the pigeons of Mecca resemble those of Venice" -- and who is to say that differences exist in those that seasonally appear in downtown Cleveland?Altogether, along with the first volume, an enjoyable read and an intriguing catalog of relevant observations, historical detail, biblical anecdotes and legends, and at the end of the volume, excerpts from earlier European "Hajis" (a "Gentleman of Rome" in 1503 and a semi-educated English youngster in 1680).A first-rate travelogue, peppered at times with overbearing detail.

New readers be warned: Burton is an acquired taste. Any of his works must take into account his personal eclecticism, eccentricities and prejudices. Therefore, while this book is tough slogging- nearly every page contains extensive footnotes and sidebars- it is not any the less fascinating (more for what it reveals about the author than for the subject).His brilliance with languages, his obsession for detail and his ability to paint a vivid picture of a then-little-known people made him unique among Victorian English explorers. His personal prejudices, particularly regarding sub-groups of people ( he loves Bedouins, doesn't care for Egyptians... thinks the White English are the peak of civilization, denigrates his fellow Irishmen)frequently seem to cancel out his progressive view of empire and the treatment and lack of respect afforded other cultures by the English Empire.Taken out of context this book will seem confusing and so politically incorrect as to be irrelevant today. Taken with a background knowledge of the writer it is a thrilling and fascinating social document and will only reinforce for many (as it did for me) an appreciation of how special and romantic a character Captain Sir Richard F Burton was.