Walking Home
Travels with a Troubadour on the Pennine Way
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Walking Home
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Narrated by:
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Simon Armitage
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By:
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Simon Armitage
About this listen
In summer 2010 Simon Armitage decided to walk the Pennine Way. The challenging 256 mile route is usually approached from south to north, from Edale in the Peak District to Kirk Yetholm, the other side of the Scottish border. He resolved to tackle it the other way round: through beautiful and bleak terrain, across lonely fells and into the howling wind, he would be walking home, towards the Yorkshire village where he was born.
Travelling as a 'modern troubadour' without a penny in his pocket, he stopped along the way to give poetry readings in village halls, churches, pubs, and living rooms. His audiences varied from the passionate to the indifferent, and his readings were accompanied by the clacking of pool balls, the drumming of rain and the bleating of sheep.
Walking Home describes this extraordinary yet ordinary journey. It's a story about Britain's remote and overlooked interior - the wildness of its landscape and the generosity of the locals who sustained him on his way. It's about facing emotional and physical challenges and sometimes overcoming them. It's nature writing, but with people at heart. Contemplative, moving and droll, it is a unique narrative from one of our most beloved writers.
©2013 Simon Armitage (P)2013 Faber AudioListeners also enjoyed...
Critic reviews
"He is diligent, prolific and wide-ranging. By balancing humour and gravitas, he generates great affection in his readers. If he is not careful, Simon Armitage will end up becoming a national treasure." (Mail on Sunday)
"Armitage has always been a wonderfully fluent writer, able to riff on almost any subject in either prose or poetry.... The result is a homage to an oddly old-fashioned Britain, full of glorious eccentrics and hearts of gold, but vividly believable for all that." (Financial Times)
"Armitage's great gift is his voice. He is able to make his walk talk as he does and I have never read a more fully inhabited book of walking. It is funny but moving, quiet but strong." (The Observer)
Ok but a bit self indulgent
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Made me want to get some sturdy boots
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Nowhere to nowhere
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Wonderful metaphors
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Simon Armitage is so relatable, funny, honest. I laughed .. a lot.
He’s never glory seeking. Not like the conquering hero walker. There’s no ego here. (Don’t think his dad would suffer that. Clearly Yorkshire dads are a match for south west Scotland dads…)
The writing is a joy of course. Like a long poem… each thought carefully processed and no stray words.
Love his reading of it - all those Yorkshire ‘t’s. Landet, walk’t, dividet.
Total joy.
The lazy walker’s delight
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Wonderfully entertaining ramble down the Pennine Way
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I had to increase the speed to 1.3 to listen though. Painfully difficult to listen to otherwise.
Engaging enough
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(And I’m a Huddersfield Lad too)
A great story…
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Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?
No, though I admit I did finish it.Would you recommend Walking Home to your friends? Why or why not?
No. I chose it for a perspective about the Pennine Way and that aspect of the book was dolorous. the poetical and observational perspectives were OK, but just OK.What didn’t you like about Simon Armitage’s performance?
Armitage's voice drones terribly and has very little animation. The main reason I listen to audiobooks rather than read the text equivalent is to get the added value from the narrator: in this case there was none.Do you think Walking Home needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?
No.Muted content; dire narration
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The poets describes the 2nd half of his journey as plod, plod, plod, blah, blah, blah. Pretty much sums up the whole experience to me.
Gave up after 6 hours which is the first audio book I have failed to finish in 200 books.
He is articulate, descriptive has an exceptional eye and turn of phrase but he is not a narrator.
It was like being back in the 1980s with the most tedious history professor who lost the passion for his job 30 years previous. He lost me after 5 minutes.
Monotone, quiet and lacking of passion. It seemed like the same sentence from the start to finish.
I understand he planned it, walked it, experienced it, edited it and performed it but I feel his pain and felt I had experienced all that too.
I am giving 3 stars for his effort.
Next time please employ a narrator.
Plod plod plod blah blah blah
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