Libel layer turned photographer, Rupert Grey, selects from his library some of his favourite and formative reads. Ruperts latest book, Homage to Bangladesh, is out now
• The Wind in the Willows
By Kenneth Grahame (1908)
Toad’s escapade in his gypsy caravan set me on a path, at the age of 11, from which I’ve never veered.
• I Haven’t Unpacked
By William Holt (1939)
This autobiography by a rolling stone affirmed that I was on the right path. Holt never found what he was looking for, but his vitality, his willingness to throw himself into the wind and grab everything that life had to offer, has lived with me ever since.
• The Royal Road to Romance
By Richard Haliburton (1925)
Haliburton, with his epic passion for adventure, made it even worse. As Vanity Fair put it, he made ‘a glorious racket out of dauntless youth’.
• Between the Woods and the Water
By Patrick Leigh Fermor (1986)
One evening in 1933, Paddy abandoned his life as a stockbroker, shouldered his rucksack, sailed to France and strolled across Europe. In this book, he describes, with an unsurpassed richness of language, a continent in the shadow of war and ancient ways of life about to be destroyed.
• Clear Waters Rising
By Nicholas Crane (1996)
Crane’s account of his walk from Cape Finesterre to Istanbul captured a significant moment in European history, not long before the internet and mass tourism altered the Continent.
• Worlds Apart
By Robin Hanbury-Tenison (1984)
The manner in which Robin combined expeditions to remote corners of the Earth with dedication to bringing about change resonated with me when I first met him in 1981. Twenty years later, I read Worlds Apart and had the same response.
• Ex Libris
By Anne Fadiman (1998)
Gripping, funny, well written and instructive. In 18 essays, Fadiman touches on the unfathomable magic of words and the abiding importance of books.
• Other Men’s Flowers
By AP Wavell (1944)
This anthology, compiled by Wavell, a field-marshal with a good memory, between fighting battles in the Western Desert in 1941, contains most of the great poems in the English language.
Read our review of Homage to Bangladesh by Rupert Grey
