Summary
Elliot first travelled to Afghanistan as a 19-year-old college student, enchanted by the fate of its people who were then under siege by the Soviet Union. This first risky visit did not diminish his affair with the country. Ten years later, during the rise of the Taliban, he returned to the country and chronicled his visit. From Kabul to the mountains of Uzbekistan, Elliot's documentary of a country is as much history as it is a personal reportage. A winner of the Thomas Cook Travel Book Award and a New York Times Notable Book for 2001.
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Media Reviews
"This absorbing mixture of narrative and reflection records a love affair with Afghanistan, and reveals how deeply Jason Elliot was affected by the country and its people." -- Philip Grazebrook
-- Times Literary Supplement
"AN UNEXPECTED LIGHT is often unexpectedly funny and constantly perceptive, but it is also profound." -- Jason Goodwin
-- New York Times
Bibliographic Details
Publisher: St Martins Pr
Published date: 2000
Edition: 1th edition
Size: 6.5 x 9.75 inches
Weight: 2.25 pounds
Pages: 473
Publisher's Notes
Part travelogue, part historical evocation, part personal quest, and part reflection on the joys and perils of passage, An Unexpected Light is the stunning account of Jason Elliot's journey through Afghanistan, a country considered off-limits to travelers for twenty years. Aware of the risks involved, but determined to explore what he could of the Afghan people and culture, Elliot leaves the relative security of the capital, Kabul. He travels by foot and on horseback, and hitches rides on trucks which eventually lead him into the snowbound mountains of the North toward Uzbekistan, the former battlefields of the Soviet army's "hidden war." Here the forbidden beauty of the Afghan landscape kindles a moving recollection of the author's life ten years earlier, when, no more than a boy, he fought with the anti-Soviet mujaheddin resistance during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Weaving different Afghan times and visits with revealing insights on matters ranging from antipersonnel mines to Sufism, Jason Elliot has created a narrative mosaic of startling prose which captures perfectly the powerful allure of a seldom-glimpsed world. An Unexpected Light is a remarkable, poignant book about Afghanistan and a heartfelt reflection on the experience of travel itself.
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