The ins and outs of writing guidebooks
“One must have with one, naturally, one or more guidebooks,” says Rose Macaulay in the introduction to her classic 1949 account of touring the Spanish coastline, Fabled Shore.
The first books I worked on were guidebooks and they were a great introduction to writing non-fiction because of the huge amount of research that needs to be done but then filtered and filleted to avoid overwhelming the reader. In the mid-1990s I worked as an unpaid researcher (ah, the naivety of youth) on The Globetrotter’s Bible and Cheap Sleep Guide to Europe, both by Katie Wood, and in the 2000s (for cold hard cash once I’d wised up) on AA Guides to Spain and Italy, and TimeOut Guides to Madrid, Barcelona and Andalucia, expertly edited by Sally Davies.
Guidebooks paint powerful and enduring pictures of a country. Travellers are advised by the, hopefully knowledgeable, authors not only about the best places to stay or to eat, but also about the very nature of the land and people they are visiting. And what we write can cast a long shadow. As my wife was born and brought up in Spain and we lived in Madrid for several years, I’m particularly interested in guidebooks to Spain and have a, small, collection of them.
“One must have with one, naturally, one or more guidebooks,” says Rose Macaulay in the introduction to her classic 1949 account of touring the Spanish coastline, Fabled Shore. “Much as these omit, they do put in a lot.” Macaulay took plenty for the trip - the latest Baedeker and Blue Guides (she caustically notes that “it is interesting to note how they occasionally show their independence of each other by differing on facts or dates.”), José Pla’s Guia de la Costa Brava, and an 1845 first edition of Murray’s Handbook to Spain by Richard Ford.
Ford’s was the first guidebook to Spain for general public consumption. Born in London in 1796, he inherited a fortune from his father, and in 1830 he and his wife moved to Spain to improve her poor health - for the following three years he travelled more than 2,000 miles around the country, taking notes, painting watercolours and generally soaking in the new culture. The couple returned to England in 1834 where he set to work on his Handbook.
It bore little resemblance to 21st century guidebooks, two thick volumes, more than 1,000 pages of closely printed text, mostly in double column, and a poor index. But it was a remarkable achievement for one man, part history, part travelogue, part modern guidebook and encyclopaedic in content. It was also a major success, selling 1,400 copies in three months.
Ford’s Handbook reads more like a ‘normal’ book than the staccato-sectioning of guidebooks we’re more accustomed to today, but it still serves very much as a vade mecum. So there is for example a long and detailed section on Spanish coins, tips on finding a groom, valet and cook, and suggestions for different kinds of tours of Spain, geological, Moorish, military, picturesque, etc. On a basic day-to-day level he is also useful. He rails, he rants, but having in mind the raison d'etre of the work, he does make useful suggestions for the visitor he knows will be travelling in his wake. He is, above all, genuine. Ford was writing at the dawn of ‘tourist’ interest in Spain and to a great extent he was the man who invented the modern idea of the country as a romantic, anti-modern, destination with wide-open spaces.
Increasing interest in holidaying in Spain in the first half of the 20th century was brought up short by the outbreak of civil war and unsurprisingly I’ve not come across any guides which cover this period. But in the 1950s, with visitor numbers picking up nicely again, Herbert W Serra Williamson compiled and edited The Tourist Guide-Book of Spain, The Green Guide, in which he says in his Preface, ‘Spain has so thoroughly changed since the era which preceded the Spanish Civil War, generally referred to as 'the good old days,' that all Guide-Books on Spain, hitherto published, are not only obsolete but even completely useless.’
By this time, a sea change had taken place in the public’s attitude to the country. Whereas before Spain was seen as something of an intriguing museum piece, now it was increasingly treated as a series of attractions to be enjoyed like an adventure park. Among this new breed of guidebook was McGraw-Hill’s 1955 Pocket Travel Guide. The preface indicates that a new type of visitor to Spain has arrived for which a new type of guidebook is necessary. “Modern, streamlined, concise for today’s tourist,” the book says it is for those, “in a hurry, for their annual holidays last only three or four weeks,” quite a contrast to Ford who suggested a year and a half was about right to do justice to Spain.
What I find particularly engaging about McGraw-Hill is the section on statistics that gives a window onto a country which bears very little relation to the one we visit today. The guide estimates that there is only one bicycle to ever 25 people, one car to 133, one wireless set to 8, and one telephone to 34. Television, it emphasises, has not yet been introduced in Spain, and there are few washing machines or refrigerators.
All these guides share a stout avowal of their objectivity, yet the truth is that they actually reflect the partial attitudes of their authors rather than being the last word on a place. Some years ago I interviewed the late Roger Williams for a book project that never saw the light of day. An author and travel journalist himself, he was managing editor at Insight Guides which are perhaps the closest in approach to Ford’s Handbook, a mixture of lengthy cultural essays and a decent amount of useful on the ground knowledge. He was remarkably frank about guidebooks.
“Guidebooks do tremendous damage to the English language,” he told me. “They can also be fairly shaky with facts. And at their worst they can be vehicles for smart-arse writers who cannot believe that they themselves or their readers are anything as infra dig as a tourist, when of course that is exactly what they are – and they should rejoice in it. Berlitz, Baedeker, Insight Guides, Rough Guides and Lonely Planet were each started by one man with a passion about a particular destination. Idiosyncratic, personal, passionate, this is the best way for guides to be written.”
What I’m reading this week: Fleishman Is in Trouble by Taffy Brodesser-Akner (I’m finding it a slow burner, but hoping it’s going to catch light soon) in rotating tandem with Diplomatic Gifts: A History in Fifty Presents by Paul Brummell which is fascinating and as a friend pointed out, exactly the kind of book I tend to write.
What I read last week: Summerwater by Sarah Moss. I really, really liked this having found her Ghost Wall rather too disturbing. Also, a lovely cover by Mel Four.
What I plan to read next week: I suspect Fleishman and Diplomatic Gifts will take another week.