Ebook The White Road Journey into an Obsession Edmund de Waal 9781250097323 Books

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Product details Paperback 416 pages Publisher Picador; Reprint edition (November 1, 2016) Language English ISBN-10 1250097320

The White Road Journey into an Obsession Edmund de Waal 9781250097323 Books Reviews

• I was initially drawn to “The White Road” by Edmund de Waal because I had read that it involved a man’s love for ceramics, his travels and research through three countries and histories, and how the book was comparable to a meditation of sorts on his love for the ceramic medium. While this is all that I am passionate about as well, it had occurred to me early on in this book that this read was going to be a struggle to get through. Indeed, yes, de Waal describes a true obsession and went into great description of porcelain’s many diverse histories; however, I ultimately found the writing style to be a bit exhausting and drawn-out.
  
  The author has been working closely with porcelain since he was seventeen, and he continues to make porcelain vessels as his creative muse decades later. One of de Waal’s dreams was to travel to the great epicenters of porcelain manufacturing. His story describes this pilgrimage as a dedication to his love for the “white gold.” He pays homage to these three “white hills” in China, Germany and England and incorporates many factors into his discoveries and research. Throughout his journeys he encounters kiln sites, ceramic institutes, museums, research facilities, porcelain factories and current sculptors. He provides elaborate histories of emperors, chemists and porcelain experimentations using his extensive research of maps, photographs, memoirs, and porcelain order archives. All elements provide an extensive text that contains an abundance of knowledge on the life of porcelain.
  
  While reading this book, my thoughts and perceptions about certain things changed. I never read about the history of ceramics, but, in reading this book, I began to appreciate my young ceramic journey from a different perspective. To know how some have cherished, valued and treasured items of ceramic nature, made me feel honored to work within such an esteemed and beloved tradition.
  
  Overall, I enjoyed “The White Road” as it gave me a lot of background knowledge and insight about this particular material. Very rarely do we have the opportunity to learn the intricacies of the depth and breadth of one item. Through his peculiar, yet interesting obsession, de Waal did this very successfully and gathered what seemed to be all that was ever known about porcelain in this one text. It was an impressive feat. One can learn much if an entire life is to be devoted to loving an item as much as de Waal does. However, in the end, I did arduously struggle with the almost 400 page text, as the writing style seemed to be written in a sort of stream of consciousness poetic format supporting an allusive and vague plot about this porcelain love affair.
• If you share de Waal's obsession with porcelain, you will be fascinated. I do; I am. Plain pottery is perfectly serviceable, you can drink your tea out of it just fine. The plates hold dinner just fine. So why this centuries-long pursuit of a plate you can hold up to the light and see the shadow of your hand through it, that you can tap smartly with a pencil and it rings like a crystal bell...Some of the stories are well known, like the mad scientist and the wacky apothecary assistant virtually imprisoned for years in Dresden until they could duplicate the purity of Chinese porcelain. De Waal goes through the meticulous German archives recording all the minutia surrounding this discovery. Meissen still commands astronomical prices. While planning exhibitions of his own work, and finishing his "Hare with Amber Eyes" surprise best seller, he revisits the Chinese clay works with mountains of discarded shards. The British side of the story is full of bankruptcy and broken dreams. The fate of fine china under Nazis and Communists is well known, though still ludicrous beyond belief. One omission I wish he had included something on Royal Copenhagen, maybe too pure...no prisons, no bankruptcy. But the story I found most compelling was the native American story of the Cherokee potters, who found a vein of fine white clay and made beautiful pots (before being evicted). I'm American, why didn't I know?
• A luminous, pleasing, slightly obsessive book about the history of porcelain, de Waal's life as as a potter and his travels to China, Dresden, Devonshire, North Carolina and (disturbingly) Nazi Germany to explore and illuminate key moments in the history of porcelain. Since his teen age years de Waal has has been enchanted by its translucent whiteness, elegance and fragility. He has made thousands of elegant objects with it, Like his earller book The Hare with the Amber Eyes, The White Road straddles, transcends (or defies) genre boundaries. Highly recommended,
• Readers of "The Hare with Amber Eyes" have complained that this book isn't the page turner "Hare" was. I agree. But I found its pursuit of the history of porcelain, de Waal's meditations on the material, the people surrounding it, and his own journey of discovery, a lovely balm for troubled times. My reaction is idiosyncratic, I know, but I recommend going along on this journey as a welcome detour from so much that's repellent in the world right now.
• Edmund de Waal combines erudition, passion, and gripping writing in this exploration of the history of porcelain, where he is also one of the world's celebrated porcelain artists. His work blurs the line between functional craft and conceptual art, and his history similarly blurs the usual distinction between the intensely personal and historical investigation. White Obsession is a fantastic read in a subject matter that many will find esoteric but having left this book, will resonate with Kangxi enamel ware, Meissen and Wedgewood in ways they never imagined.
• I almost passed on this book after reading Laura Miller's mundane review in the New York Times, but thankfully I did not, as I understand how an obsession with porcelain can lift it off the ground. If you are not a romantic you will have a hard time here. Like Ms. Miller you will miss the point entirely. You will miss the poetry and the insight into the emotions described and shared, past and present.
  This is a book of fascinating history and soul-searching obsession. I also recommend Utz by the British writer Bruce Chatwin.