Book Review: North to the Orient, by Anne Morrow Lindbergh (1935)

 

Anne Morrow Lindbergh, author and aviator. 

Charles Lindbergh and his wife Anne Morrow Lindbergh, 1931, on the trip chronicled in Anne's book North to the Orient.

Hardcover copy of North to the Orient, by Anne Morrow Lindbergh, 1935.

North to the Orient was Anne Morrow Lindbergh’s first book. Published in 1935, the book recounts a 1931 journey Anne took with her husband, aviator Charles Lindbergh. With Charles flying and Anne operating the radio, the Lindberghs flew over northern Canada, Alaska, Japan, and China, mapping possible routes for commercial air travel. Charles and Anne flew in a two-seater Lockheed Sirius Model 8, with pontoons for water landings. The plane is now at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC.  

Anne Morrow Lindbergh was a talented writer, and her prose is vivid and memorable. She wanted North to the Orient to be something more than merely a travel book, and it is much more than just a “and then we went here” account of their trip.  

The Lindberghs were America’s glorious young couple, and their trip was highly publicized. The day of their departure from Long Island, Anne meditated on the difference between how she and Charles were treated by the press: “Over in the corner my husband is being asked vital masculine questions, clean-cut steely technicalities or broad abstractions. But I am asked about clothes and lunch boxes.” (p.17)  

I wish that maps were included in North to the Orient, as I found myself Googling the remote settlements the Lindberghs were flying to. In Baker Lake, Canada, supplies only arrived once a year. One of the men who lived there told Anne and Charles, “Our newspapers are a year old. We get three hundred and sixty-five at a time, and read one every day—just as you do at home—only, of course, the news is a year late.” (p.35) This was a fascinating detail, and I kept mulling this over in my head long after I read it. 

One of my favorite passages was Morrow Lindbergh’s evocative description of a 12-hour overnight flight from Baker Lake to Aklavik. “It never grew dark. For hours I watched a motionless sun set in a motionless cloud-bank...Always the same. Until I wondered, in spite of the vibration of the engine which hummed up through the soles of my feet, whether we were not motionless too. Were we caught, frozen into some timeless eternity there in the North?” (p.43)  

Scattered throughout the book are occasional glimpses into the Lindberghs’ life together. Anne writes that Charles “was scientific and orderly and efficient enough for two.” (p.74) I can believe that. This is a man who trimmed the margins of the maps he took on The Spirit of St. Louis, in an attempt to save every ounce of weight he could.  

At the time of their trip in 1931, the Lindberghs left behind their 1-year-old son, Charles Lindbergh Jr. By the time North to the Orient was published in 1935, the Lindbergh’s baby was dead, the victim of one of the most notorious kidnapping cases. The accused kidnapper, Bruno Hauptmann, was found guilty in February 1935 and was appealing the verdict on death row when North to the Orient was published. (Hauptmann was executed in 1936.)  

Anne Morrow Lindbergh does not mention any of these dramatic events in North to the Orient, but there is a scene where she shows a Russian woman photographs of her young son. Knowing what will happen, the scene becomes especially poignant.  

“The trapper’s wife made big circles with her hands to show how big his eyes were and pointed to the photograph she liked the best. Then, picking out others, she made me understand by pointing again, ‘This looks most like his mother,’ and ‘This is like his father.’” (p.77) 

Anne and Charles have tea in Japan, and their host tells them that there should always be five people at the traditional tea ceremony. Anne has this insight: “A good number, I thought. If one talks to more than four people, it is an audience; and one cannot really think or exchange thoughts with an audience.” (p.106) That’s a fascinating idea: when does a group become an audience? 

When the Lindberghs arrived in China, the country was suffering from catastrophic flooding of the Yangtze River. Charles made several flights surveying the devastation for the Chinese government and supplying aid to the victims.  

A year after the publication of North to the Orient, the Lindberghs were at a dinner with King Edward VIII of England when Anne had the following encounter: 

“Those two women: ‘I’ve just read your book, Mrs. Lindbergh,’ then turning to the Beauty beside her, ‘She’s written a book!’ They both look at me with astonished curiosity. ‘Has she written a book?’ Incredulous, as though to say, ‘She has a pet chimpanzee,’ or ‘She hangs by her teeth in the circus’! I feel like Alice in Wonderland. Somehow this demands an explanation: ‘It’s just a book about our trip, you see.’ ‘Oh,’ said the Beauty, somewhat relieved and comprehending. This is not so strange. ‘Oh, a sort of a diary, I suppose.’ ‘Well, not exactly—I wrote it two or three years later.’ Vague confusion on the part of the ladies. Then (ah—the explanation!): ‘Did you write it yourself or did someone help you with it?’ ‘No,’ I laugh out loud, ‘oh no, I wrote it myself.’ ‘Well...well, all yourself.’” (The Flower and the Nettle: Diaries and Letters, 1936-1939, p.61-2)  

The Appendix to North to the Orient makes entertaining reading, as it lists all of the equipment the Lindberghs took along. There are long lists of emergency equipment for landing on both land and water. There is also a flight log for the trip, which lasted more than two months. Charles Lindbergh could not have found a better partner for his flights than Anne, as she mastered radio transmissions and took all of the twists and turns of the journey in stride.  

I was reading North to the Orient in a coffee shop when a woman sitting next to me commented that she had read the book as well. We chatted briefly about what a good writer Anne Morrow Lindbergh was. I was pleasantly surprised that the 87-year-old book I was reading sparked a conversation. North to the Orient is a testament to Anne Morrow Lindbergh’s superb writing, as the book still feels fresh today.