High Caucasus
The gripping and beautiful memoir of travelling along Russia's wildest frontier
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High Caucasus
Narrated by:
Tom Parfitt
Buy Now for ₹667.71
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Narrated by:
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Tom Parfitt
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Written by:
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Tom Parfitt
'Gripping' ECONOMIST
SHORTLISTED FOR THE RSL CHRISTOPHER BLAND PRIZE
SHORTLISTED FOR THE PUSHKIN HOUSE BOOK PRIZE
SHORTLISTED FOR THE EDWARD STANFORD TRAVEL BOOK OF THE YEAR
Emotionally scarred after witnessing the bloody climax of the Beslan school siege in Russia's North Caucasus, in which 314 hostages died, Tom Parfitt set out on a journey. In High Caucasus, he shares his remarkable thousand-mile quest in search of personal peace - and a greater understanding of the roots of violence in a region whose fate has tragic parallels with the Ukraine of today.
Starting in Sochi on the Black Sea and walking the mountains to Derbent, the ancient fortress city on the Caspian, Parfitt traverses the political, religious and ethnic fault-lines of seven Russian republics, including Chechnya and Dagestan. Through bear-haunted forests, across high altitude pastures and over the shoulders of Elbrus, Europe's highest mountain, he finds companionship and respite in the homes of proud, little-known peoples. This is a stunning story of confronting trauma through connection with history, people and place.©2023 Tom Parfitt
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Critic Reviews
Tom Parfitt has written an extraordinary book, a thrilling, profound masterpiece. His curiosity, courage and empathy shine from every page. I was gripped, from start to finish (Nicholas Crane, author of Clear Waters Rising)
A thrilling and beautiful book. Tom Parfitt's extreme walk along Europe's wildest frontier - through the mosaic of restive statelets on the southern edge of Russia - is epic in itself, but it offers too a drill-down into the deepest layers of human experience - collective memory and individual survival, the legacy of horror and the joy of healing (Philip Marsden, author of The Summer Isles, The Spirit Wrestlers and The Crossing Place)
Superb. Tom Parfitt is one of our great travel writers: curious, indomitable and brave. His account of his journey on foot across the North Caucasus is a masterpiece of observation and lyrical prose. (Luke Harding, author of Invasion)
With this book, Tom Parfitt has re-invented travel writing for the 21st century. He's an adventurer with a heart; a journalist who saw too much death, but who - instead of running to the next crisis - confronted the horror and crafted a testament for its victims (Oliver Bullough, author of Moneyland)
A remarkable story of intense experience, thoughtfulness and feeling (Tristan Gooley, author The Natural Navigator)
In these tender pages Tom Parfitt finds in the meadows of the North Caucasus and even in Russia itself a dignity that transcends circumstance. This is a travel book for our time, one that seeks fragments of hope among shards of war. Thoughtful, uplifting and hugely enjoyable. (Sara Wheeler, author of Terra Incognita)
Tom Parfitt is the best kind of journalist - brave, empathetic and insightful, and with a beautiful writing style (Shaun Walker, Guardian correspondent; author of The Long Hangover)
Evocative, intimate and insightful, this is an extraordinary look at life as a foreign correspondent as told from the messy inside. Tom Parfitt is brilliant at zooming in and out of the bigger picture, revealing the sweep of history as it's being written whilst also capturing every detail and feeling up close and personal. This beautifully written account of his relationship with the Caucasus in the aftermath of Beslan offers essential context for anyone trying to understand what is happening in Ukraine and Russia and what might happen next. Most of all, High Caucasus is a reminder of how deeply these not-so-far-away conflicts affect us all (Viv Groskop, author of The Anna Karenina Fix)
The finest contemporary interpretation yet written of the landscape and people of the North Caucasus. Sharply observed and quietly devastating, High Caucasus reveals how a highland region scarred by war, despotism, and empire has also produced cultures and communities of awesome, resilient beauty (Charles King, author of The Ghost of Freedom)
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