'Professional' traveler Holman undertook adventures fearlessly

06-04-2006

   

The book's subtitle says it all.

	This 1830 portrait of James Holman is in the collection of the Royal Society, London "A SENSE OF THE WORLD: HOW A BLIND MAN BECAME HISTORY'S GREATEST TRAVELER" By Jason Roberts HarperCollins ($26.95)

In this most readable biography, Jason Roberts recounts the remarkable accomplishments of James Holman, an early 19th-century adventurer who, despite poverty and blindness, managed to travel around the world for five decades.

In essence, he became one of history's first "professional" travelers before the infrastructures of long-distance travel -- railroads, passenger ships, even improved roads -- had been developed.

Born in 1786, Holman writes he had "been conscious from my earliest youth of the existence of this desire to explore distant regions to trace the variety exhibited by mankind under different influences of different climates, customs and law."

He left home at age 12 to see the world, enlisting in the British Navy. Intelligent, ambitious, capable and handsome, he worked his way up to the rank of lieutenant at 25, when an unknown disease stole his sight.

Rather than retreating, Holman resolved to be as independent as possible and taught himself to rely on his other senses to find his way around and gather impressions.

He secured a position as a Naval Knight, a small honorary society that offered him a small income and sanctuary at Windsor Castle, but at the price of his freedom. He also pursued a medical education for three years.

Looking for new avenues of escape Holman set off on his first journey into the unknown on Oct. 15, 1819, the morning of his 32nd birthday.

It was an independent expedition through Western Europe to the Mediterranean. But rather than the comfortable grand tours then popular, Holman traveled slowly and cheaply.

Diminished in sight but not in insight, he relied on his own haptic sensations (touch), as well as smell, hearing and taste. Holman also gathered impressions of others he met along the way. Returning to England nearly two years later, he turned his memories into a book.

Just as his volume was being delivered to bookstores, Holman was setting off on his second expedition, an attempt to circle the Earth eastward across Russia and Siberia. Although his effort failed after two years, his journal, coupled with the novelty of a blind man's impressions, captivated the public. His books brought him both celebrity and wealth.

For another three decades, Holman continued to travel and gather experiences, completing more than a dozen ambitious and dangerous trips, including a seven-year adventure that took him around Africa to India, China and Australia. But, the popularity of his books waned as traveling increased.

When he died in 1857, Holman had been forgotten and his last manuscripts were lost.

Roberts has done a remarkable job of resurrecting Holman from obscurity, painting a portrait of a complex and compelling persona against the background of his life's journeys.

Distinguishing between those who travel as a function of career and those who "venture forth on their own initiative, to their own itineraries," he anoints Holman, whose travels, he believes had covered more than 250,000 miles by 1846, as history's greatest traveler.

He also succeeds in re-creating the broader social, political and physical contexts of the world and times through which Holman traveled. Nor does he miss the poignant philosophies and ironies involved.

My one qualm is that although Roberts includes 20 historical illustrations, his book would have been considerably improved if maps had been included.

[Back to Articles Main]