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In The Empire of Genghis Khan: An Amazing Odyssey Through the Lands of the Most Feared Conquerors in History | 
 enlarge | Author: Stanley Stewart
Publisher: The Lyons Press
Category: Book
List Price: $22.95
Buy New: $6.00
You Save: $16.95 (74%)
New (11) Used (18) from $4.59
Avg. Customer Rating:  14 reviews
Sales Rank: 423385
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1st
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 288
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.2
Dimensions (in): 9.3 x 6.4 x 1
ISBN: 1585747033
Dewey Decimal Number: 950.2
EAN: 9781585747030
ASIN: 1585747033
Publication Date: November 18, 2002
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
Vivid, hilarious, and compelling, this eagerly awaited book takes its place among the travel classics. It is a thrilling tale of adventure, a comic masterpiece, and an evocative portrait of a medieval land marooned in the modern world. Eight and a half centuries ago, under Genghis Khan, the Mongols burst forth from Central Asia in a series of spectacular conquests that took them from the Danube to the Yellow Sea. Their empire was seen as the final triumph of the nomadic "barbarians."In this remarkable book Stanley Stewart sets off on a pilgrimage across the old empire, from Istanbul to the distant homeland of the Mongol hordes. The heart of his odyssey is a thousand-mile ride, traveling by horse, through trackless land. On a journey full of bizarre characters and unexpected encounters, he crosses the desert and mountains of Central Asia to arrive at the windswept grasslands of the steppes, the birthplace of Genghis Khan. (6 x 9, 288 pages)
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| Customer Reviews: Read 9 more reviews...
 An Excellent Read February 24, 2007
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I've always been intrigued by the Mongols, as they are at the edge between settled and nomadic people. And I've also always like travel writing. Stanely Stewart's book therefore made me very happy. It is beautifully written and the research is thorough. I learned about the Secret History of the Mongols in one section and in another found one of my favorite senteces in any book. I do not have my copy with me, but the sentece included truck repair, camels, and Uzbeks.
Mr. Stewarts book is too good to be called a travel memoir and to lively to be called a history book. It is one of the most entertaining and informative books I have read.
a great vicarious voyage April 5, 2006
I picked this book up browsing in my hospital bookshop while on call on a lazy saturday. On the back cover I discovered it had been recently translated into Italian (2004)from English and decided to buy it. From the moment I opened it, I couldn't put it down, I read it on work, at home, and also while driving the car (!). I laughed by myself on more than one occasion and looked around for someone to laugh with me. Naturally, I will probably never go to Mongolia, or have the guts to take the trip the author went through, but, somehow I felt that I was there. That I met the people he describes.
One interesting point of the book is its inspiration from the trip of William of Rubruc eight centuries ago. This short miliary description of the mongol world of those times has the same off hand descriptions of the mongol people and customs we find in Mr. Stewart's book. However, no one accused William of beeing "politically not correct" or "sarcastic". Often it is not necessary to have an empathic vision of a different culture to describe it to people that share our cultural standards.
Mr. Stewart's book is instructive and definitely fun to read, but above all it "takes you along" the whole time, which is really what readers that don't have the opportunities to travel as much as they would like, really want.
Good travel story June 3, 2005
4 out of 5 found this review helpful
I am amazed by Mr. Stewarts ability to write. He can convey the emotions and feeling of a place with amazing clarity and I found myself really feeling like I was there.
The trip itself is quite an epic, a thousand miles by mostly horseback through a culture completely different than anything we are used to. it also comes at a really interesting time in the countries history when they have thrown off Communism and are deep in the throws of trying to make something else work.
At its best the book is full of delightful descriptions of faraway places and unique locations, the people are described so well that you can picture them sitting next to you and their conversations relate items of real significance. Learning from the people what the fall of Communism has done to their economy makes for fascinating reading. Also learning about the history of the Monks and the world of Genghis Khan was fascinating.
At its worst, the book doesn't cut the Mongolian people very much slack. They have decided not to live in cities but rather to live in tents (gers), rather than celebrate a thousand-year-old tradition and show what good it brings and how it enriches the lives of the people who live it, mostly you get the feeling that it is inferior and the people who live it ought to switch to something better.
It also portrays Communism and the Russian government in a completely evil light, no effort is made to record areas where the life of the Mongolian has gotten better thanks to Communism, although brief mention of government bldgs, schools and acting troups is mentioned. Yet how poorly the people fared and when the system didn't work is vividly brought out into the open.
This is also about travelling over some of the most lonely isolated terrain in the world, yet little time is spent discussing the travel itself. How did they get food when they were not in a Ger, what did it feel like to spend weeks in the saddle from morning to night, How did the clothing feel, etc. Very little was spent on the actual travel itself, the book focuses primarily on the people that were met.
But these are minor points, its is a good book to learn about the culture of Mongolia and what has been happening to the common man since the fall of Communism and I found myself reading all the way through without being bored.
 condescending May 15, 2005
4 out of 6 found this review helpful
I couldn't put this book down, i'll give it that much.
But I didn't always like it.
While the narration was interesting and fairly well written, I felt a rather pretentious, and quite condescending air as he described the mongolians he met and the way in which they lived.
The descriptions of the landscape were beautiful, but it didn't hide the fact that I felt Stewart was narrating a 4 star resort tour of the country instead of what was supposed to be a wilderness trek.
None the less, I found it hard to put it down, maybe because the historial bits were so intruiging.
a KEEPER.....just fabulous...... March 28, 2005
2 out of 5 found this review helpful
a joy to read... a man who captivates language .... GREAT and fun book.....
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