Last week we said good bye to someone who will forever hold a special place in our hearts as well as on our shelves, the wonderful Jan Morris. She had that rare talent to really take you places and introduce you to the people through her writing.
In 2018 we awarded Jan Morris the Edward Stanford Outstanding Contribution to Travel Writing at the Edward Stanford Travel Writing Awards (the image above is her with her globe trophy). A bold move from us considering she famously didn’t like being called a travel writer.
She told us, “The reason why I don’t think of myself as a travel writer is because I’m not writing about travel, I’m writing about the effect of travel upon people, and in particular, me.”
There is no denying that her work had a huge influence on many travel writers and a lot of our friends had wonderful things to say about her:
“She doesn’t tell you how to get there, where the station is or how to get to the nearest hotel or what drink to buy in a certain place. That’s not what she does. She goes in far more subtly and delicately into the life of the place she writes about…. Her sense of history is extraordinary, she just lightly makes references to the people who settled in Venice or lived in Trieste in Victorian times. She just manages to smoothly bring them all in. It’s almost poetry I think.” – Michael Palin
“From Spain to Sydney and all the places in between, there aren’t many people in this world as well-travelled as Jan Morris. And not only does she travel to amazing places, she manages to through her words, to take us with her on her journey. Often travelling by herself but never giving that feeling of loneliness. It makes us want to get out there and explore more which is what great travel writing is all about.” -Phoebe Smith
You can watch a video of Michael Palin, Phoebe Smith and Levison Wood introducing Jan Morris for her ESTWA award here:
Here is a video of Jan Morris accepting her globe trophy at her home in North Wales.