Marco Polo: From Venice to Xanadu [Deckle Edge] [Hardcover]

Laurence Bergreen (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 23, 2007

As the most celebrated European to explore Asia, Marco Polo was the original global traveler and the earliest bridge between East and West. A universal icon of adventure and discovery, he has inspired six centuries of popular fascination and spurious mythology. Now, from the acclaimed author of Over the Edge of the World: Magellan’s Terrifying Circumnavigation of the Globe (“Superb . . . A first-rate historical page turner”—The New York Times)—comes the first fully authoritative biography of one of the most enchanting figures in world history. In this masterly work, Marco Polo’s incredible odyssey—along the Silk Road and through all the fantastic circumstances of his life—is chronicled in sumptuous and illuminating detail.

We meet him as a callow young man, the scion of a wealthy Venetian merchant family, only seventeen when he sets out in 1271 with his father and uncle on their journey to Asia. We see him gain the confidence of Kublai Khan, the world’s most feared and powerful leader, and watch him become a trusted diplomat and intelligence agent in the ruler’s inner circle. We are privy to his far-flung adventures on behalf of the Khan, living among the Mongols and other tribes, and traveling to magical cities, some far advanced over the West. We learn the customs of the Khan’s court, both erotic and mercantile, and Polo’s uncanny ability to adapt to them. We follow him on his journey back to Venice, laden with riches, the latest inventions, and twenty-four years’ worth of extraordinary tales.

And we see his collaboration with the famed writer Rustichello of Pisa, who immediately saw in Polo the story of a lifetime; enlivened by his genius for observation, Polo’s tales needed little embellishment. Recorded by Rustichello as the two languished as prisoners of war in a Genoese jail, the Travels would explode the notion of non-Europeans as untutored savages and stand as the definitive description of China until the nineteenth century.

Drawing on original sources in more than half a dozen languages, and on his own travels along Polo’s route in China and Mongolia, Bergreen explores the lingering controversies surrounding Polo’s legend, settling age-old questions and testing others for significance. Synthesizing history, biography, and travelogue, this is the timely chronicle of a man who extended the boundaries of human knowledge and imagination. Destined to be the definitive account of its subject for decades to come, Marco Polo takes us on a journey to the limits of history—and beyond.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Drawing on original writings and walking in the footsteps of Marco Polo himself, Laurence Bergreen's Marco Polo: From Venice to Xanadu is the most definitive biography of the legendary traveler to date, separating the man from his considerable myth.

Look inside Marco Polo (Click on thumbnails to see a larger image):

Marco Polo: a traditional portrait; Granger	Frontispiece of an early published edition of Marco Polo’s Travels, Nuremberg, Germany, 1477; Granger	Kublai Khan, emperor of the world’s largest land-based empire; Granger
Marco Polo commanded a Venetian galley similar to this in the Battle of Curzola; Granger	Stone carving on the Marco Polo bridge; Laurence Bergreen	Marco Polo’s vivid and occasionally misinterpreted descriptions of his travels inspired this medieval artist to depict dragons in China; Granger

Marco Polo timeline (All dates given in the Julian calendar):

1215 - Kublai Khan, the grandson of Genghis Khan and Marco Polo's mentor, is born.

1254 - Marco Polo born in Venice, although one tradition locates his birthplace in the Venetian colony of Dalmatia.

1260 - Kublai Khan becomes leader of the Mongols and in 1271 founds the Yuan ("Origin") Dynasty.

1271 - Young Marco Polo leaves Venice with his father Niccolo and uncle Maffeo, bound for the court of Kublai Khan.

1274 - Kublai Khan oversees a failed Mongol invasion of Japan, as the Mongols, masters of the Steppe, meet their match at sea.

1275 - The three Polos arrive in Shang-du, Kublai Khan's summer palace immortalized by Samuel Taylor Coleridge as Xanadu; Marco begins his years in the service of the Khan.

1276 - 1293 - Marco travels throughout Asia, reaching the coast of India, and possibly Zanzibar, gathering intelligence for Kublai Khan and serving as a tax collector for the Yuan (Mongol) dynasty.

1281 - Kublai Khan's second failed invasion of Japan, a serious blow to his prestige.

1292 - The Polos escort Princess Kokachin to Persia to marry, their last formal service to Kublai Khan before departing.

1294 - Kublai Khan dies, freeing the Polo family, who undertake a dangerous return voyage by sea.

1295 - Marco, his father, and uncle, arrive in Venice after their 24-year absence. They have been away for so long that their fellow Venetians do not recognize them.

1298 - Marco is captured by the Genoese in the Battle of Curzola, according to some accounts, and confined to a cell in Genoa with a romance writer, Rustichello of Pisa, to whom he dictates his adventures in China, his reminiscences of Kublai Khan, his life among the Mongols.

1300 - Safely back in Venice, Marco Polo marries Donata Badoer; the couple has three daughters.

1324 - As manuscript versions of his exploits spread throughout Europe, Marco Polo dies in Venice, claiming that he did not reveal the half of his experiences in his remarkable Travels.

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From Publishers Weekly

Even in his own day, the famed 13th-century travel writer Marco Polo was mocked as a purveyor of tall tales—gem-encrusted clothes, nude temple dancing girls, screaming tarantulas—in his narrative of his journey to the Chinese court of the Mongol emperor Kublai Khan. In this engrossing biography, Bergreen (James Agee: A Life), while allowing that mere facts... were never enough for Marco, finds him a roughly accurate and perceptive witness (aside from the romantic embellishments and outright fabrications concocted with his collaborator Rustichello of Pisa) who painted an influential and unusually sympathetic portrait of the much-feared Mongols. Bergreen follows Polo's disjointed commentary on everything from Chinese tax policy to asbestos manufacturing, crocodile hunting and Asian sexual mores—Polo was especially taken with the practice of sharing one's wife with passing travelers—while deftly glossing it with scholarship. Less convincing is Bergreen's attempt to add depth to Polo's lurid taste and over-heated imagination by portraying him as both a prophet of globalization and a pilgrim and explorer of the spirit. Polo's spiritual trek didn't take him very far, since he ended his days back in Venice as a greedy, litigious merchant. Still, the result is a long, strange, illuminating trip. 16 pages of photos, 3 maps. (Oct. 25)
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Product Details

• Hardcover: 432 pages
• Publisher: Knopf; First Edition edition (October 23, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 140004345X
• ISBN-13: 978-1400043453
• Product Dimensions: 6.5 x 1.5 x 9.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (48 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #596,094 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #93 in Books > Travel > Europe > Italy > Venice

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

123 of 129 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Marco Polo, November 11, 2007

By 

Stephen Balbach (Ashton, MD United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Marco Polo: From Venice to Xanadu (Hardcover)

Marco Polo (1254-1324) was not the first European to make it to China, but he was the first to bring the news back to a wider European public. As famous as he is, Marco Polo remains a mysterious and controversial figure. The author of this biography Laurence Bergreen is probably best known for his wonderful account of Magellan's circumnavigation of the globe and there is a connection - it was on that journey beginning in 1519 that one of the 18 survivors named Antonio Pigafetta, the official chronicler, had read and was inspired by Marco Polo's "Travels".

Marco Polo's "Travels" (ca. 1298) is not a single account but about 119 surviving manuscripts, each one different and none authoritative. Scholars have tried to patch the various versions together over the centuries, but in the age before the printing press, Marco kept handing out new hand-written copies with additions and subtractions, and others would make more copies adding their own embelishments or mistakes: chronology would change, ordering of events would change as if the pages were dropped on the floor and re-assembled incorrectly, specifics of events would change, places and people changed, etc.. there is no "correct" version. Bergenger bases his account on the longest version available and usually does not question its accuracy, rather, often pointing out why it must be so (except for a few well known problems).

The "Great Question" that has haunted "Travels" since it first appeared is its veracity; children are said to have followed Marco Polo chanting, "Messer Marco, tell us another lie!". Until the 19th century it was mostly seen as comparable to The Travels of Sir John Mandeville (1357), an enjoyable but fanciful account. When scholars in the 19th and early 20th centuries were able to verify through Chinese records many of the details, and with the recognition of the importance of the Age of Discovery and global trade and travel in World History, Marco has become today one of the most well known figures of the Middle Ages. Yet there still remain a few critics who question if Marco Polo actually ever went, and this myth of the "faked Travels" hangs over it. Even in Colin Thubron's recent review of this very book in The Washington Post (November 4, 2007; Page BW10) he raises the question; but as Bergreen says in the "Epilouge", it would have been a more amazing feat to amass so much accurate information about Asia without actually going there, then to have made the trip and write about it (Occam's Razor).

Four stars instead of five because I think Bergreen is not able to create a convincingly strong central narrative like he did in "Over the Edge"; he shows Marco Polo develop from a naive youth to a curious sensualist, into a spiritual awakened middle aged man into a petty, cranky and aged ex-opium addict - we know very little about Marco Polo the person, it is conjecture when faced with Marcos externally orientated "Travels" - the portrait is believable but the sources are weak. Bergreen also sometimes makes allusions to current events which will dilute the books timeless appeal.

The book is organized with an Introduction, 15 chapters, and an Epilogue. Most of the issues discussed in this review are in the Epilogue and they hung over me while reading the body of the story, which is essentially an excellent re-construction of "Travels". One approach is to read the Epilogue first, putting the text and story in historical context. Then enjoy one of the most astounding snapshots of the world in time ever compiled - 13th century Asia in all its extremes, diversity and exotica.

48 of 49 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars NICELY DONE - A PLEASURE TO READ AND INFORMATIVE., January 13, 2008

By 

D. Blankenship (The Ozarks) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Marco Polo: From Venice to Xanadu (Hardcover)

For the most part, this was a pleasing book and a very interesting read. We have plenty of blow by blow reviews already posted here, most of them quite well done, so I won't go into the page by page details with this review which has already been done. Simply stated, the author, Laurence Bergreen, has taken many of the surviving manuscripts (there are, I understand, well over 100 variations at this time, but I suspect there have been many, many more over the years) and attempted to tell the story of the adventures of Marco Polo and his travels from Europe to China, and beyond, during the 13th century. The author has done a very nice job of this.

Polo's journey, by ship and by land, lasted well over twenty years. He became quite involved with the court of the almost mystical Kublai Khan. Now the author is quick to point out that there are many discrepancies in the Polo papers but is also quick to point out that much of what was written has since proven to be true. I am one of those that feel that Marco Polo did actually make the journey he wrote about, but also feel that there was a tremendous amount of exaggeration on Polo's part and I feel the reader must remember that the world was being viewed through the eyes of a man of the 13th century. I think the author has made a good case for Polo and has done a very good job of pointing these facts out. This was a world so different than ours, that I personally, find it a bit difficult to comprehend, at times. What is fact and logical for us, was simply not so during the time of Polo's travels. The reader must remember this.

Overall the book was quite well written and certainly held my interest, for the most part. His observations and explanations as to what Polo wrote are quite logical and well stated. The author has an easy style and can indeed hold the reader's interest. This is the first book by Bergreen I have read, so I cannot compare this work with his other works as several reviewers have. I can only judge this book as a stand a lone, and to be honest, I was impressed. If his other works are better, then they must be quite good.

I did have a couple of problems with this work, ergo, the four stars and not five. I found it quite frustrating that there were really no maps available in the book. Fortunately I have a rather large collection of period maps in my collection, but to be honest, going back and fourth from book to map, was a real pain and distracted from the reading. I feel it quite impossible to gain the full impact of Polo's travels without an intimate knowledge of the geographical areas concerned, or a set of very good maps. I feel the author should have provided these. I also felt that some of the book was just a bit repetitive at times which caused it to drag a bit.

All in all, I learned much from this book, enjoyed reading it and feel richer for having done so. What more could you ask. I do recommend this one for those that have an interest in this particular subject.

34 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating details about MP's trip, November 8, 2007

By 

Wayne Price (Dallas) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Marco Polo: From Venice to Xanadu (Hardcover)

Prof. Bergreen has written an excellent book about Marco's travels, with references collected not only from MP's journal, but also details about the history of the Mongols. Most of us western readers don't know much about the varied history of Western China and Mongolia, especially the fear these folk engendered in Europe during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Bergreen fills in many gaps in our knowledge, and does so in a readable manner. One helpful characteristic of the book is that the chapters are divided up into short sections, marked only by the several spaces between each one. As the subjects are so mixed, this is a helpful arrangement. TWO criticisms. One, there is a good bit of repetition in the book. How often do we need to be told that MP was challenging common European knowledge of the East? Second, why aren't there more maps in the book? There is only one very small map (p. 265) that shows the route of the travels, and this one page map includes everything from Venice to China's eastern coast. A number of small maps along the way would have been very helpful to the reader. Some of the illustrations, though, are well done and interesting.