A comedy, a history, a traveller's tale of love and adventure...join young Lord Exford on his journey to the Greece of heroines and philosophers, pashas and janissaries. The year is 1788. George III is on the throne. To escape debt and court summonses the rakish Exford is exiled to Constantinople with a prudish tutor and a truculent artist. On the way they are shipwrecked on a Greek island ruled by a Turkish pasha and populated with stories of passion and delusion. Star-crossed lovers, renegades and minstrels, pirates and djinn are just some of the characters our travellers encounter. They also meet Amelia Burbage, a botanist, feminist and intrepid explorer, accompanied by her Syrian servant and their irascible camel. Befuddled by a heady mix of the pasha's hashish, amorous ardour and his classical education, Exford's delusional tutor takes on the might of the Sultan and it is left to the wily Exford to deliver his eccentric band from an unspeakable fate.

Harley and the Holy Mountain is about a road trip from the island of Evia, through central Greece and ending at the monastic state of Mount Athos. It is a sequel to It's All Greek To Me! with similar humour, self-deprecation, entertaining stories, and insights into today's Greece. Greeks are brought up to believe they are direct descendants of the Ancient Greeks whose language they speak. They also believe they are custodians of the one true religion, Orthodoxy, the defining characteristic of Greekness for two thousand years. As we meander north we encounter the key moments in three thousand years of history that every Greek is familiar with and create their sense of who they are. Some are celebrated, for example the War of Independence from the Ottomans, others are no less powerful but unspoken, like the Civil War of 1946-49. We come across the different peoples that created today's Greece. A hundred years ago the first language of half the population was not Greek but any one of Albanian, Aromanian, Macedonian, Pomak, Tsakonian, Romaniote, Ladino, Romani, Turkish, Italian and half a dozen Anatolian dialects with all their racial and cultural baggage. Having travelled through time and space, I leave Harley at the frontier of Athos and plunge into a spiritual dimension. Wonder-working icons and relics are channels to the divine; everyday miracles are part of nature; the marvellous deeds of saints are facts not metaphors. Their reality permeates Greek culture and sense of self. Greece is two hundred years old. Out of a patchwork of cultures and languages Greeks have forged a homogeneous European nation. Since the bloody revolution against the Ottomans, Greeks have resisted British, French, Russian, German, Italian, Bulgarian and American incursion, invasion or domination. The struggle continues for independence from the Brussels, Frankfurt and Washington institutions that control its finances. Through turbulence and disaster Greeks have created a vibrant, enterprising, European democracy with a unique identity. It is an extraordinary story of an extraordinary people. Harley and the Holy Mountain joins in the celebration. And the fun.

An ordinary man. An extraordinary journey.In 1394 Nicola Martoni made a dangerous journey from a small town in Italy to Jerusalem.He was a little, short-sighted, middle-aged provincial lawyer.He sailed through Aegean storms to Egypt, walked across the desert in high summer, climbed Mount Sinai with malaria, and finally made it to the Holy Places. Five companions died on the way.Desperate to get home and running out of money, he wandered from island to island and across mainland Greece, braving more storms, shipwreck, pirates, mercenaries and brigands, sustained by curiosity, determination and faith in God.It was an age of marvels and miracles, before printing and the intellectual and scientific revolutions that shape our world. His journal translated from Latin, gives us a rare insight into a medieval mind.Join him on his journey.

This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.

UPDATED EDITION WITH A NEW CHAPTER Intoxicated with dreams of a Greek paradise, John Mole inflicts upon his family a tumbledown ruin on a hillside with no water, no electricity, no roof, no floor, no doors, no windows and twenty years of goat dung... far away from the tourist resorts and posh hotels. Through hard work and comic misadventures a bond is formed with a vivid cast of village characters - from Elpida who cures back pain with raw eggs to beautiful Eleni yearning for Dusseldorf - over bottles of ouzo, whisky and wine. If only Hector the dog would calm down.

All the Frogs collects together the poems John Mole has written for children since the publication of This is the Blackbird which was shortlisted for the CLPE Award. As in his previous collections, he conveys the mystery, humour and sometimes pain to be experienced in everyday situations, and relishes the free play of rhythm and rhyme. Several of the poems here call out to be read aloud while others are more suited to quiet moments of thought. John Mole writes for children in the playground and for the solitary child in his or her private space. Charles Causley described an earlier collection as 'the work of a true poet' and the same can surely be said of All the Frogs.