JOURNEY TO KHIVA

One of those wry, literate travel books that the British seem to specialize in—and that's as much an investigation of an unfamiliar place (here, Central Asia) as a vehicle for encountering the sublime and the ridiculous. Long fascinated with the lands and cities of Central Asia, Glazebrook, a novelist (Captain Vinegar's Commission, 1987, etc.) and travel-writer (Journey to Kars, 1984)—hoped to learn what drew so many adventurers to those sites. This was the region that in the 19th century had been the playing field for the ``Great Game,'' in which Russia and Britain competed for dominance of the Indian subcontinent. Here, anecdotes about famous players like the noble but doomed Arthur Conolly—who gave the Great Game its name—and the brutal Russian General Kaufman form the link between Glazebrook's travels and the past. Setting off in May 1990, the author travels first by train to Moscow, which he finds ``so new and unpredictable that no one knew what to expect of it from one day to the next.'' Though brutally attacked in his hotel by a knife-wielding thief, Glazebrook recovers sufficiently to fly to Tashkent, where he's met by his official guide and driver. Traveling to legendary cities (Samarkand, Bokhara, etc.), the pair pass through polluted landscapes bereft of any signs of their Islamic past—testimony to Stalin's imposition of Communist ideology and disastrous agricultural practices. The cities, built mostly of drab concrete, prove as depressing as the countryside; the trip's high point ends up being an idyllic picnic on a lake near the Oxus River. Yet despite the disappointing terrain and his fears for the region's future, Glazebrook notes that Central Asia remains for him ``a green oasis composed of many kindnesses.'' An intelligent introduction—if overburdened by footnotes—to a place only recently accessible, by a writer of disarming modesty and humor. (Maps)