The Summer Isles is the name of small islands just off the north-west coast of Scotland, near Ullapool. It is to these little-known islands that Marsden sails single-handed from Cornwall in his wooden sloop Tsambika. He chooses to sail along the exposed western Atlantic coast of the Republic of Ireland, not without its dangers. He misses Northern Ireland completely, sails northwards again along the western coast of Scotland but inside the Western Isles, which he also misses.
His journey is redolent with snippets of the myths and legends of the western British Isles, especially those of Ireland/Hibernia. That the Bibliography refers to 173 other works and the Author’s Notes are 20 pages long reflects the wide scope of Marsden’s interest. Yachting Monthly’s review that the ‘… voyage is as thickly littered with poets and singers as with rocks and headlands’ perfectly summarises this literary content of The Summer Isles.
At times, though, it is confusing, so that a previous knowledge of Irish Celtic folklore would be a great advantage. Yet in the shorter Scottish section – only five chapters to Ireland’s 15 – Bonnie Prince Charlie’s dramatic 1745 escape via the Isle of Skye and the famous ‘Skye Boat Song’ rate no mention at all. The Scottish passage from Islay to Ullapool, with finally only a sighting of the Summer Isles because of adverse weather, is too quickly over. And the voyage remains strangely unbalanced.
While The Summer Isles is interesting it is not riveting which, as Tsambika is a timber vessel, is fitting.
Reviewed by David Iggulden
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Philip Marsden is the award-winning author of a number of works of travel, fiction and non-fiction, including The Bronski House, The Spirit-Wrestlers, The Levelling Sea and The Summer Isles. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and his work has been translated into 15 languages.
After years of travelling, he now lives on the tidal upper reaches of the River Fal in Cornwall with his wife, children and various boats.
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