Lead Review (The Hero’s Way)
- Book: The Hero’s Way
- Location: Italy
- Author: Tim Parks
In the summer of 1849, Giuseppe Garibaldi, Italy’s legendary revolutionary hero, fled Rome and led 4,000 of his men hundreds of miles through Umbria and Tuscany, then across the Apennines, Italy’s mountainous spine, toward the refuge of the Venetian Republic. After thirty-two exhausting days of skirmishes and adventures, only 250 survivors reached the Adriatic coast.
Tim Parks follows in Garibaldi’s footsteps in 2019, just a few months before the global pandemic (it must have been wonderful/frustrating to have been putting the finishing touches to this travelogue when the world was in lockdown). Accompanying him on this journey is his then partner Eleanora, now wife, and the two seem to co-exist in relaxed companionship as the kilometres pass.
150 plus years separate the two journeys, each taken under very different circumstances, and the author blends the past and present with aplomb, reflecting on what he sees now, and how to interpret his experiences with a historic slant.
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