# A Time of Gifts

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- Book: [A Time of Gifts](https://www.bookquiver.com/patrick-leigh-fermor/a-time-of-gifts) ([A Time of Gifts.md](https://www.bookquiver.com/patrick-leigh-fermor/a-time-of-gifts.md))
- Authors: [Patrick Leigh Fermor](https://www.bookquiver.com/patrick-leigh-fermor)
- Publisher: john_murray
- ISBN: 978-13-9983-685-2
- Published: 2026-07-16
- Language: en_GB
- Binding: Softcover

## Description

WITH A FOREWORD BY JAN MORRIS 'A treasure chest' Spectator 'A masterpiece' William Dalrymple, Financial Times In 1933, aged eighteen, Patrick Leigh Fermor set out on his 'great trudge', a year-long journey by foot from the Hook of Holland to Istanbul. Three decades later he wrote A Time of Gifts, the sparklingly original account of the first part of this youthful adventure. Alone, carrying only a rucksack and a small allowance, he travelled through the Low Countries, up the Rhine, through Germany, down the Danube, through Austria and Czechoslovakia, and as far as Hungary. Hailed as a masterpiece, A Time of Gifts is in part a coming-of-age memoir, but also a rich and compelling portrait of a continent that - despite its resplendent domes and monasteries, great rivers and grand cities - was soon to be swept away by war, modernisation and profound social change. 'Rightly considered to be among the most beautiful travel books in the language' Independent