topics: |  travel | river | picture-book

Written for a BBC series.
Michael Wood:		The Congo
William Shawcross  :	Mekong,
Christina Dodwell :	Sepik and Waghi,
Germaine Greer :	Sao Francisco
Russell Braddon:	The Murray.
Brian Thompson:	Nile,

RIVER JOURNEYS. By Russell Braddon, Christina Dodwell, Germaine Greer,
William Shawcross, Brian Thompson and Michael Wood. Illustrated. 208
pp. (Hippocrene Books, $19.95.) These half-dozen travel pieces by as many
hands chronicle brief trips up or down six rivers great in name or
challenge. Michael Wood, stirred by Joseph Conrad, steams up the Congo;
Christina Dodwell floats the Sepik and Waghi rivers of Papua New Guinea;
William Shawcross goes up the Mekong in Vietnam and Cambodia in a journey
interesting because of the circumstances of war; Germaine Greer rides on the
Sao Francisco of Brazil; with a good humor, Russell Braddon pursues from
source to mouth the Murray of Australia; and Brian Thompson covers the
Nile. I like the idea, but the results mostly range from television script
reportage to thorough description like that in the encyclopedic Nagel
Guides. Buried in the middle of the book, however, is the best essay - Miss
Greer's presentation, detailed and disturbing, of cultural decay. This piece,
not the Congo one, Joseph Conrad would recognize. Facing the truth that these
somewhat canned journeys were occasioned by the desire to produce a
television short series, she reports her own meetings and those of the male
film crew with the Brazilians. Unlike some of the other voyagers, she does
not celebrate the adventurer over the adventure. Her presence alone comes
close to making the book good. Wm Blue Heat Moon, nyt Travel books 1985