Reviews for Freedom to Roam: South Pennines and the Bronte Moors: Including Ilkley Moor

The average rating for Freedom to Roam: South Pennines and the Bronte Moors: Including Ilkley Moor based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2013-02-17 00:00:00 GREGORY MILLER I don't think that I've ever seen a book tag-line so succinctly sum up exactly what it is about but this book is most definitely "a journey through the British Empire with Victoria Wood" and little else (not, of course, that I would want it to be anything else). The narrative takes you through the colonial histories of Ghana, Jamaica, Newfoundland, India, Hong Kong, Borneo, New Zealand, Australia and Zambia with a handy (and pleasantly vintage) map at the front. As well as the history, it looks at the social and economic results of British rule, the influence of imperialism and both the resentment and gratitude felt by the modern populace. The book accompanies a television programme, presumably of the same name - I haven't seen it but I would certainly be interested in watching it if I could find it. It comes complete with a decent amount of photographs (I love photo-sections of non-fiction books!), although many of the pictures look remarkably dated and old-fashioned - especially given that the book was only published in 2007. I really enjoyed reading this book and I certainly learned a lot but I was disappointed to discover that Victoria Wood did not write it in its entirety (the word 'with' as opposed to 'by' in the title should have been a give-away and seems really obvious to me now. I feel very silly). I was expecting a pleasant history lesson laced with humour throughout but instead, I got three completely distinct narratives that if I am totally honest, jarred with each other. The introductions to each chapter (and thus, each country) were written by Victoria Wood. They were short, humorous and easy to read but contained little other than personal anecdotes. The main body of the chapters alternated between dry, historical facts and figures presented in boxes, that read like a school text book and current, more socially aware narrative that seemed to focus primarily on modern views and read much like travel literature. The latter sections were definitely more enjoyable for me - not least because they contained the most emotion and relevance to modern day society. The dry, historical sections seemed exactly that - arid and dull. They weren't actually arid and dull of course - they were stocked full of exciting wars and different cultures - and that just goes to show the dryness of the narrative. I phased out in many of these sections and had to re-read them to understand what was going on. In some cases, I just carried on regardless of the fact that I wasn't paying attention and it doesn't seem to have made much of a difference at all. What was even more infuriating was the seeming lack of any editing of these sections at all (although only in these sections). There were typos and odd sentence formations which in themselves didn't help me to focus and enjoy the information. It seemed almost as though these parts were in their first draft, whilst the rest of the book had been edited to publication standard. In addition, the writer often assumed previous knowledge of cultures and histories - some which I understood, some which I didn't. Again, these irritated me somewhat. Victoria's Empire is definitely a book worth reading if you want to an enjoyable and informative read but be prepared for the sudden narrative changes and the occasional long-winded passage.

Review # 2 was written on 2020-05-31 00:00:00 Villy Svahn I gave this one three out of sentimentality for Victoria Wood, but really its a two: its was weird mix of travelogue and history, but not very good at either. It seems the team went out of their way to interview people who had a good view of the British. Everyone was very 'yay British': apparently we brought law and education everywhere we went. As far as a travelogue goes, they seemed to turn up late everywhere which meant they missed the thing they went there for. My final moan is that Victoria herself didn't have more of a voice. There are three credited authors: Wood, a travel writer and a historian. Wood herself only writes the intro to each country and the fore/afterwords. They are funny and sweet and very her but then the other writers take over and it's just dull and sounds like my own travel journal writing. All in, this book will not tell you anything useful about the countries as they are now, and the history is very white.