Advantages: Funny and wide-ranging meditation on the real and the romantic railway Disadvantages: Never quite comes together
...the first place.
Like parallel lines, he says, the two railways will never meet. His explorations of the reasons for this are diverse, witty and fascinating. But they are, by definition, doomed to remain unresolved.
Still, he starts well. Almost too well, in fact, because the rest of the book struggles to match the opening. The first page describes a hilarious encounter outside St Pancras station with a pair of prostitutes who mistake him for a ... ...it has many similarities to Parallel Lines. Both are based around a mundane aspect of our transport infrastructure. Both comprise a series of linked excursions. Both feature odd and oddly-nicknamed artistic travelling companions and many entertaining digressions. But Sinclair's book wove those elements into art. Marchant lacked that alchemical spark for me; he could only approach, but never quite reach, that elusive destination.
Published by Bloomsbury ...
Silverback 02.05.2005
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