Hudson, W H – The Bell Bookshop

Purple Land: An Adventure in Uruguay – the Banda Oriental

Emma — Thu, 10 Oct 2019 00:00:00 +0000

The Purple Land is a romantic novel set in the war-torn borderlands of Uruguay, the Banda Oriental. The story of Richard Lamb, an idealistic young Englishman, it begins with his abduction of Paquita and their escape from the vengeance of her Argentine father. Finding refuge in Montevideo, he is catapulted into a series of picaresque adventures: horse-stealing, duelling, escaping prison, and fighting on the losing side of a civil war, all the while falling constantly and unsuitably in love. Rooted in Hudson’s evocation of the simplicity and dignity of life on the pampas as well as his masterful depiction of its wildlife and landscape, The Purple Land is the first modern ‘road novel’. It is also a narrative of transformation, the Creolisation of an Englishman, redeemed by the heightened exuberance, energy, warmth and innate humanity of South America.

Shepherd’s Life

Emma — Thu, 01 Dec 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Considered a classic at the time of its publication in 1910, A Shepherd’s Life is a rare account of the lives of those who lived on and worked the land in nineteenth-century rural Britain. A masterful work of prose, W. H. Hudson focuses on the story of one man, a Wiltshire shepherd named Caleb Bawcombe, whose tales of sheep dogs, farmer’s wives, poachers and local fairs become a sublime account of a way of life that has largely disappeared from these shores.

Shepherds Life

Emma — Thu, 21 Oct 2010 00:00:00 +0000

Through the story of one man, Caleb Bawcombe, a shepherd whose flocks graze the Wiltshire, Hampshire and Dorset borders, we meet men and women of humble birth, poachers, gypsies, farmers and labourers striving to survive on the land. As we read, the cumulative affect of their stories becomes much more than a record of rural life.