For the duration of their summer holidays, however, they transform into Captain John, First Mate Susan, Able Seaman Titty, and the Ship's Boy Roger. This is the second instalment in the Swallows and Amazons series.įor most of the year John, Susan, Titty, and Roger are siblings. 'Much better fun not knowing what was coming next.' 'When a think's done, it's done, and if it's not done right, do it differently next time. 'We're all duffers sometimes, but it's only now and then that we get found out.' Now that Ransome has made it clear there's a lot more to come, can't wait to go through the third book (and the rest). I don't thing I speak for all when I say thins, but, Titty Walker and Nancy Blackett are becoming two of my favorites characters of all time. It was also great having the entire gang from before. What surprised me the most was - even with the environs being more or less the same as Swallows and Amazons - how little repetition we find while continuing through this new journey, which is to be expected in a series like this. This second installment of the series is much more fun, and gets better in almost everyway compared to the original. Just when you start to think that the author had written everything he had in his mind the first book, Swallowdale will quickly make you realize that cannot be further from the truth. All remain in print and have been widely translated.Īrthur Ransome died in June 1967 and is buried at Rusland in the Lake District. Today Ransome is best known for his Swallows and Amazons series of novels, (1931 - 1947). Settling in the Lake District, he spent the late 1920s as a foreign correspondent and highly-respected angling columnist for the Manchester Guardian, before settling down to write Swallows and Amazons and its successors.

Ransome married Evgenia and returned to England in 1924. These contacts led to persistent but unproven accusations that he 'spied' for both the Bolsheviks and Britain. He knew many of the leading Bolsheviks, including Lenin, Radek, Trotsky and the latter's secretary, Evgenia Shvelpina. Petersburg, where he was ideally placed to observe and report on the Russian Revolution. He used this precarious existence to practice writing, producing several minor works before Bohemia in London (1907), a study of London's artistic scene and his first significant book.Īn interest in folklore, together with a desire to escape an unhappy first marriage, led Ransome to St. In 1902, Ransome abandoned a chemistry degree to become a publisher's office boy in London.

Arthur Michell Ransome (Janu– June 3, 1967) was an English author and journalist.

Swallowdale arthur ransome