Eric Newby, Kolkata and the book. A true story.

That year, there was prodigious flooding in Calcutta. People stumbled in gutters, water up to their knees in parts of Chowringee. Boys on tea stalls raised their kit on boxes and hoped for the best. Everone who lived on the street had found enterprising ways to elevate their home, too. Resourcefulness, as ever. Families soaped themselves under the municuipal pumps and the suds floated into the road.

Flora had her dress tied around her knees, so it wouldn't get too wet or torn on potential underwater obstacles.She was on her way to the book shop. Just to look. There was, as usual, a plethora of Indian published Penguin books. But amongst them, she found an immaculate copy of Eric Newby's A Book of Traveller's Tales. Having always been a fan, she bought it and took it back to the hot little attic room with no cooling breeze. Lying on the bed, she found the book was inscribed with the words: To Ted and Vi, in memory of a happy walk on Dorset cliffs, Eric. The text was signed by the author.

In Dorset late that summer, it had been balmy; here, the rains still came and people, as they do during a bad monsoon, began to fall sick with waterborne disease - particularly when the sewers flooded. Flora wondered if Eric Newby was out walking on Beeny Cliff, how the book got to West Bengal --  and felt terribly homesick.



Thank you to Subhodev at www.flickr for this shot. I have enjoyed his picture series entitles 'Old Calcutta' and I like the humour and feeling of this one, in particular.