Travel Accounts Asia from Orchid Press

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 2000. The author has edited and woven together an amazing array of descriptions of Burma by early travellers, quoting over 90 sources. Having thoroughly researched past travellers' accounts, he elegantly constructs, from these, a vivid history of the country. A compact, highly readable 'thinking man's' travel guide. 208pp., 45 colour and b&w plates, 4 maps, bibliography, index.… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 2003. Describes a selection of early travellers' impressions of the Khmer empire's ancient 12th century capital and the legends that inspired the majestic stone temples of Angkor, which a visitor in the 1920's declared 'the most impressive sight in the world of edifices'. The work brings to the reader many out-of-print impressions of early Western travellers and… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 2006. This account of plant-hunter and explorer Frank Kingdon-Ward's 1933 expedition to the southeastern corner of Tibet was as significant for his geographic revelations as it was for the wealth of plant species with which he returned. On this journey Kingdon-Ward reached as far as the Salween River, a particularly remote area of Tibet not previously known… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 2005. Thailand. The name evokes images of golden pagodas, emerald rice fields, jungled mountains, a happy, gregarious people. Siamese Bestiary reveals another aspect of Thailand--the intimate coexistence shared by animal and human life in the tropics. Lizards play hide-and-seek on walls and ceilings; frogs colonize bathrooms and crabs doze behind water jars; turtles make nocturnal visits; snakes… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 1997. A collection of 31 short poems originally published in the Rangoon Gazette for an Anglo-Burmese / Anglo-Indian readership. Described by the author as a 'literary sampan'. Many evoke an Englishman's nostalgia for his homeland. The Colonial Library of Dignified Irreverence reprint of 1910 Rangoon edition. 96 pp., gilt edges. Decorative Cloth. As New. 17.5 x 12… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 1998. A tongue-in-cheek series of sketches of nineteenth-century colonial life in India, originally published in Vanity Fair and so popular that it ran to six editions. Delightfully irreverent! The Colonial Library of Dignified Irreverence reprint of 1896 6th edition. 252 pp., 13 b&w illustrations, gilt edges. Decorative Cloth. As New. 14 x 10.5 cm.

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 2004. Captain Robinson, completing a posting as a young British administrator in remote northern Burma, returned to Mandalay in 1923 to await a new assignment. One evening, Robinson and two friends came by chance upon an opium den. While his friends called it a night, Robinson stayed on to sample the forbidden pleasures within-a decision that was… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 1998. Subtitled : 'Some 19th Century Europeans in the Himalayan Regions and Central Asia'. A compilation of the fascinating biographies of a number of 19th century Western travellers in the Himalayas and Central Asia, including Richmond Shakespeare, Joseph Hooker and Ashley Eden, among others. 182 pp., 19 colour and 17 b&w plates, 5 maps, notes on… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 1998. Subtitled 'Or the Ingredients of Social Life at "Our Station" in India'. A light hearted account of life in India, with 40 delightful vignettes, including 'Our Colonel', 'Our Padre', 'Our Magistrate's Wife', 'Our Racecourse', 'Our Bazar', 'Our Agriculturists' and "Our Nuwab'. Each is accompanied by a watercolour illustration. The Colonial Library of Dignified Irreverence reprint of… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 2016. Maugham's tale of travel through Burma, Indochina and Siam in the 1920's, told with all of the empathy and sharp-eyed observation of human nature for which the author eventually became legendary. Reprint of the 1930 edition with new introduction by H. K. Kuloy. 254 pp.. Reprint. Soft Cover. New. 20 x 13.3 cm.

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 2001. Adam's Peak in Sri Lanka is one of the five places where Gautama Buddha left the trace of his foot, but it is also an important place of pilgrimage for Muslims, Hindus and some Christians. This book examines the Sinhala pilgrimage tradition both from Sinhala and non-Sinhala sources, and explains the cult of Saman, the white… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 2005. A new memoir of the author’s journeys among the brave indigenous peoples of some of Asia’s most remote and violent regions. Knowledgeably obsessed with Burma’s struggle for freedom, American artist/activist Mirante breaks laws and infiltrates borders, in impassioned journeys of discovery that take her through China, India, Laos, and chaotic Bangladesh. Down the Rat Hole is… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 2006. Burma's Icy Mountains describes two expeditions to Burma-one on his own and a second, with a larger American party close to the Burma-China border-completed by the intrepid explorer and plant hunter, Kingdon-Ward, prior to the outbreak of WWII. Not published until the post war period some ten years later, the book is of particular interest in… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 2002. Masson was one of the most courageous and resourceful early British explorers in Central Asia, wandering over the Punjab, Baluchistan and Afghanistan between 1827 and 1840, usually alone and on foot. During his lengthy sojourn in Kabul, he collected a vast number of coins which revealed previously unknown Graeco-Bactrian and Kushan monarchs, excavated a significant number… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 2002. The coup d'état of 18 May, 1688 in the Siamese 'Versailles' at Lopburi led to the establishment of the last Ayutthayan dynasty. But it was not just another internal palace coup in face of the imminent death of the reigning monarch, Narai. For the King's favourite, Phaulkon, had been instrumental in bringing a French expeditionary force… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 2001. Subtitled 'and Enjoy the Totalitarian Experience'. Penetrating and empathetic insights into the daily lives and trials of the Burmese people as they eke out an existence under the ever watchful gaze of their oppressive military government. Syrota, an Australian human rights activist, spent many months roaming the cities and countryside meeting and chatting with citizens from… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 2003. A new biography of the American diplomat and linguist William Rockhill (1854-1914). Rockhill's renown is experiencing a revival among members of a growing group. Tibetan Buddhism, its art and philosophy, now attracts more students and a wider general audience beyond that still small circle of Tibetan scholars. Rockhill's name, once almost forgotten except in connection… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 1999. Subtitle : 'Performed by Six Jesuits Sent by the French King to the Indies and China in the Year 1685'. An account of a Jesuit mission to Siam in 1685, doomed to failure by indiscreet attempts to convert the Siamese King to Catholicism, ignoring the King's desire to focus on political and commercial relations. Reprint of… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 2002. A remarkable personal account of a sojourn of nearly eight years in Tibet, ending in 1952, compiled from the notes, sketches and photographs of Peter Aufschnaiter. An Austrian agricultural engineer, Aufschaiter developed a deep love and sympathy for the Tibetan people, sentiments which were readily reciprocated. Throughout his stay in Tibet, Aufschnaiter worked tirelessly not only… Read more about this item

Bangkok: Orchid Press, 2005. Subtitle : The record of an Arduous Journey of Exploration and Research through the Unknown Frontier Territory of Burma and Tibet. Records the 1914 expedition of Kingdon-Ward, the famed plant-collector and explorer, along the eastern branch of Burma’s great Irrawaddy River. A classic travel and botany account, told in the author’s inimitable style, with much… Read more about this item