(Untitled)

[kateorman]

And from the Independent, here is a reading comprehension test for all you high schoolers:"Michael Palin is a kindly and intelligent soul, but one thing I doubt he would ever claim to be is a pillar of English literature. A few years ago, at the behest of a television company, he travelled from North Pole to South Pole, and produced a spin-off book

Comments

[stevencaldwell]

Interesting. Makes me ask you a question, though. Which of your own novels have you never read again?

[kateorman]

Pretty much all of them. I'm gonna have to wait at least another ten years before I can look at them again.

[jvowles]

Actually, nearly all the Pythons are reasonably well regarded in academia, and I think at least one or two of them has been a college professor. (Terry Jones' book on the Crusades was a damned sight better than anything I read for college. It was more informative and much better written, and was entertaining to boot.)

Palin is the author of a solid half-dozen well-regarded travel documentary books, of which the aforementioned book is one of earlier examples. They are among the best examples one could wish for in a travelogue, and have the added benefit of being by a celebrity, with a TV show as supplemental material.

This is among the worst sort of snobbery. Once you get kids into the idea of reading, and reward them by making it interesting, you've got lifelong learners.

[kateorman]

A single Google query pulled up extracts from the book at the "Pole to Pole" Web site, leaving the reviewer with even less excuse for his laziness.

[kitzen_kat]

That's hysterical!

Of course, the bloke from The Independent would do a better job, I'm sure. After all, he wouldn't have to crack a book to see if it was actually worth studying. :-)

[angriest]

As it turns out I have read Pole to Pole, and it was a delightful travel book.

[dameruth]

I've never understood the whole "famous people can't write good books" bias. I mean, yeah, there are lots of crappy celebrity "autobiographies" ghost-written by others, but talent in one area isn't an automatic guarantee of *lack* of talent in another . . .