Kingdom of Ten Thousand Things - An Impossible Journey from Kabul to Chiapas,
by Geddes, Gary
- Used
- Hardcover
- Signed
- first
- Condition
- See description
- ISBN 10
- 0002001004
- ISBN 13
- 9780002001007
- Seller
-
North Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Payment Methods Accepted
About This Item
Kingdom of Ten Thousand Things - An Impossible Journey from Kabul to Chiapas, Geddes, Gary. HarperCollins Publishers Canada, Limited, Toronto, 2005. First Edition/First printing. Signed on title page by author. 8vo up to 9½" tall. 332pages.Yellow boards with gilt spine titles; mapped endpapers. In mint condition with a discreet remainder near spine; jacket is unclipped with the slightest of shelf wear.
From war-torn Afghanistan, through the snow-capped Himalayas and across the burning sands of the Taklamakan desert, to a rapidly modernizing China and on to the Central American jungles: it is an impossible journey, but one that Gary Geddes eagerly undertook in order to retrace the voyage of the legendary 5th-century Buddhist monk Huishen. Geddes was long fascinated with stories of Huishen's life and travels: this Afghan holy man fled Kabul for China and may have crossed the Pacific to North America 1,000 years before Columbus. The length and breadth of this expedition, and its difficulty, would have been amazing enough on its own, but Geddes's trip takes on an added dimension and poignancy due to its timing: he reaches Afghanistan one month before September 11, 2001 and arrives in China as the tragic events unfold.Along the way, Geddes encounters Afghan refugees, Pakistani dissidents, Tibetan monks, Buddhist scholars, a KFC outlet in Luoyang, mysterious cairns in Haida Gwaii, and ghostly remains in Mexico. As the Silk Road morphs into superhighways, ancient sculptures turn into military targets, Geddes glimpses, in the collision of past and present history, important clues for imagining a workable future.
Gary Geddes is a Canadian poet, writer, editor and critic.
From war-torn Afghanistan, through the snow-capped Himalayas and across the burning sands of the Taklamakan desert, to a rapidly modernizing China and on to the Central American jungles: it is an impossible journey, but one that Gary Geddes eagerly undertook in order to retrace the voyage of the legendary 5th-century Buddhist monk Huishen. Geddes was long fascinated with stories of Huishen's life and travels: this Afghan holy man fled Kabul for China and may have crossed the Pacific to North America 1,000 years before Columbus. The length and breadth of this expedition, and its difficulty, would have been amazing enough on its own, but Geddes's trip takes on an added dimension and poignancy due to its timing: he reaches Afghanistan one month before September 11, 2001 and arrives in China as the tragic events unfold.Along the way, Geddes encounters Afghan refugees, Pakistani dissidents, Tibetan monks, Buddhist scholars, a KFC outlet in Luoyang, mysterious cairns in Haida Gwaii, and ghostly remains in Mexico. As the Silk Road morphs into superhighways, ancient sculptures turn into military targets, Geddes glimpses, in the collision of past and present history, important clues for imagining a workable future.
Gary Geddes is a Canadian poet, writer, editor and critic.
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Details
- Bookseller
- Back Lane Books (Member of IOBA) (CA)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- 2417
- Title
- Kingdom of Ten Thousand Things - An Impossible Journey from Kabul to Chiapas,
- Author
- Geddes, Gary
- Book Condition
- Used
- Quantity Available
- 1
- Binding
- Hardcover
- ISBN 10
- 0002001004
- ISBN 13
- 9780002001007
- Publisher
- HarperCollins Canada
- Place of Publication
- Toronto
- This edition first published
- February 2005
- Bookseller catalogs
- MAPS AND GUIDE BOOKS; MEMOIR AND BIO; SPIRITUAL/RELIGION/MYSTICAL;
Terms of Sale
Back Lane Books (Member of IOBA)
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About the Seller
Back Lane Books (Member of IOBA)
Biblio member since 2016
North Vancouver, British Columbia
About Back Lane Books (Member of IOBA)
Welcome! BACK LANE BOOKS is home to thousands of carefully selected antiquarian, rare and used books. Visitors are welcome - please phone ahead to make an appointment. I strive to provide accurate descriptions of each listing and I always include my own photographs of the item for sale. Appraisals are also available. Colleen Croft.
backlanebooks@gmail.com www.backlanebooks.com 604 209-5072
backlanebooks@gmail.com www.backlanebooks.com 604 209-5072
Glossary
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- Jacket
- Sometimes used as another term for dust jacket, a protective and often decorative wrapper, usually made of paper which wraps...
- Spine
- The outer portion of a book which covers the actual binding. The spine usually faces outward when a book is placed on a shelf....
- Gilt
- The decorative application of gold or gold coloring to a portion of a book on the spine, edges of the text block, or an inlay in...
- Title Page
- A page at the front of a book which may contain the title of the book, any subtitles, the authors, contributors, editors, the...
- Remainder
- Book(s) which are sold at a very deep discount to alleviate publisher overstock. Often, though not always, they have a remainder...
- Shelf Wear
- Shelf wear (shelfwear) describes damage caused over time to a book by placing and removing a book from a shelf. This damage is...