Jonathan Raban 1942-2023
Jonathan Raban, who died on Tuesday, was the author of many books, of fiction, criticism, reporting, memoir and travel writing. Of Old Glory (1981) and Coasting (1986), Mark Ford wrote in the LRB that ‘their skilful mixture of social criticism, political analysis, self-exploration and traveller’s anecdote suggested ways in which, in the right hands, the hybrid travel book can respond to the different dimensions of contemporary reality more flexibly than more generically pure kinds of writing.’ Reviewing Passage to Juneau (1999), Frank Kermode praised its ‘exact prose’ and ‘unaffected, accurate poetry’.
Raban also wrote a dozen pieces for the paper, several of them on US or British politics. The first, in 1987, was a review of three poetry collections; the last three, published between 2017 and 2020, were recollections of his early childhood and of his father’s experiences in the Second World War, at Dunkirk and Anzio. They will form part of his memoir, Father and Son, to be published in the autumn.
Trying to keep track of my father and his troop as they move through this momentous sequence of events is like trying to keep one’s eyes on a single small fish in a vast migrating shoal of pilchards. Now you see it, now you don’t, and you never will again.
Comments
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18 January 2023
at
2:44pm
Bob Jope
says:
Such sad news. Writing that's richly lyrical and yet perfectly restrained, a warmly empathetic but acutely attentive critical intelligence. I've enjoyed his work ever since reading 'The Society of the Poem' when it was published just before I went up to University. He never let the reader - certainly this reader - down.
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18 January 2023
at
6:14pm
Ted Eames
says:
A very fine writer gone. 'Passage to Juneau' is the most fully realised example of the elusive genre of blending travelogue with personal memoir. It inspired me to get to know the Pacific North-West, and provided a gateway to further Raban reading. Thank you, Jonathan.
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18 January 2023
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7:21pm
Colin Barnes
says:
One of the literary guides of my life for over forty years. I raise a glass.
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18 January 2023
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8:36pm
Bryan Woy
says:
What sad news. I always appreciated his writing, full of insight and good sense - "My holy war" a good, relatively recent example. I was delighted to find that he was still alive and writing when the LRB published "War is noise", his memoir about his father, in December 2020. And now he's gone; "Paix à son âme", as we say here.
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19 January 2023
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11:33am
Oscar O duchon
says:
Very sad to hear about Jonathan Raban’s death yesterday. Have read and re- read Passage to Juneau and enjoyed it each time. He had a wonderful gift of connecting with a reader in an intimate and very personal way . I’ve never met him or seen him on screen but feel as if I know him not just as a writer but a friend and confidante.
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19 January 2023
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8:44pm
sheila42
says:
He was a great writer. Coasting, published in 1986, about sailing round Britain during the Falklands War, and observing the nation from a distance was my introduction to his work. And Old Glory, when he navigated the Mississippi and observed middle America was equally detached and yet personal. We were born in the same county in the same year, somehow this matters to me. A loss.
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19 January 2023
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10:33pm
Adam Cook
says:
I love his book "Robert Lowell's Poems, A Selection", which illuminated the poems in such a clear, insightful and exciting way. It helped set me on the path to becoming a writer.
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