Albanian Journal: The Road to Elbasan (Terra Incognita Series , No 2)

by Edmund Keeley

Release Date: December, 1997

Edition: Paperback

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Money down the toilet!

I was deeply disappointed in this dumb book, but I should of known better just by seeing the word journal in the title of the book. I was hoping to get some input on Albania and its culture and this book didn't do that. It was like reading someones personal travel journal. This book is money down the toilet, Oh well!

Europe's Survivors

Edmund Keeley's sharp eye and even sharper intelligence conspire in this slim if somewhat pricey memoir to suggest that where there are humans there is hope. This is a journal of of Keeley's short trip to Albania in the late 90s to take part in a television interview, part of a mutual co-operation project in which US writers are supposed to help Albanian writers to get their act under way and Albanian writers are supposed to offer similar help to their American counterparts. But the author's sensibility takes in a lot more. We get a glimpse of empty, weed-grown lots, refuse in the streets and a people totally unprepared for participation in the democratic process. Keeley writes about adventure and discovery and harks back frequently to the annotations of Edward Lear, the 19th landscape painter who found things even darker and dirtier than Keeley does. But the author makes it clear that hope for the future lies in the bright and cultured people who have still not sunk into the despair that afflicts most of their compatriots. Outside the cities there is still much beauty in the mountains and rolling hills, but their real beauty is that they roll into Greece, where the author's serious emotional energy has always been heavily and rightly invested. This trip necessarily involves contacts with stiff and boring diplomatic personnel and involvement in their also boring social functions. But there are exceptions to this: a few of the Americans living in Albania in an official capacity are genuinely likeable. The Albanian Bujar Hudhri is the principal interpreter and host for Keeley and his companions, and he is certainly likeable, but is put upon from all sides in a country where directives from above usually lack any sense of pragmatic reason. Interesting are Keeley's reflections and meditations on history and literature, inspired by just about anything, including the lumpy bed in his less than attractive hotel room. This work is recommendable for anyone interested in travel writing of the finer sort. Keeley always writes beautifully.