A Beachcomber in the Orient
By Harry L. Foster
"Harry L. Foster, author of The Adventures of a Tropical Tramp, has evidently not mastered the technique of tramping, for he carries luggage and has it stolen. He writes his publishers, Dodd, Mead & Company:
'Just at present I have a position as a pianist in a waterfront saloon, patronized by British sailors. I receive no salary, but when the patrons have become sufficiently intoxicated, somebody passes the hat around.
'You see, when I wrote you that I would remain in Saigon, I intended to do so, but an Italian poet ran away with my baggage, and I have been chasing him ever since, and, owing to my lack of fortune, I am getting farther and farther behind. But that will give a plot to my new book--"A Beach Comber in the Orient"--a picture of myself hiking all over the Orient with one suit of clothes and a camera, pursuing my other possessions.
'I walked on foot across Indo-China and Siam, beat my way on freight cars through the Malay States to Singapore, and have now arranged with a sea-captain to take me to Borneo, where I'll derive some means of reaching Manila. In these days of business depression, I'm not finding employment as I found it in South America, so my book will be a story of how I bummed my way, rather than how I worked my way.'"--From the New York Times "Books and Authors" column, April 16, 1922
SYNOPSIS
A Beachcomber in the Orient was the second travel narrative written by Harry La Tourette Foster, a veteran of World War One who really couldn't "go back down on the farm" after he had seen Parie. Gripped by a impulse to adventure, Foster spent most of his life after the war wandering the main roads and back roads of the world, first in Mexico and South America, then later in Asia, the South Pacific, and the Caribbean.
This book, however, is a splendid story of "real life" lived on the down-and-out. After being kidnapped and robbed in an opium den, the plucky Foster finds himself penniless on the mean streets of 1922 Saigon.
Never fear, though, Foster is up to the challenge. He soon hooks up with another ex-pat who is bound for Thailand, and in his one and only suit of clothes, Foster tramps through the thick Southeast Asian jungles with scarcely a thought.
As his tale unfolds, Harry finds his skills at survival taxed to the extreme. And once again, he ability to play honky-tonk piano leads to his ultimate rescue.
Foster's observations understate his resiliance and courage. His prose flows easily between stories of the characters he meets and descriptions of the places where he works or visits. Foster offers both a window into the excitement of true adventure in a very dangerous and misunderstood part of the world during the early part of the 20th Century, and also a window onto the inherent prejudices of East versus West.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Harry La Tourette Foster was born in Brooklyn in Oct. 31, 1894, the son of Alonzo Foster and Mary Emily La Tourette. He went to prep school at the Newton Academy in New Jersey, and then attended Lafayette College in Easton, Pa. While still in college, though, he joined the 1st R.O.T.C. at the Madison Barracks in New York (1917), and after graduation was commissioned as a 2nd Lt., infantry, and sent to serve with the 78th Division in France.
Foster's level head and courage quickly got him promoted to 1st Lieutenant, and he became an instructor in modern warfare. His last posting took him to the Mexican border in 1918 to serve with the the 25th U.S. Infantry. When he was discharged in 1919, he worked his way down through Mexico and Central America until he reached Panama. From there he worked his way through parts of South America, detailing his travels and exploits in The Adventures of a Tropical Tramp
For the next decade, Foster stayed on the go despite catching malaria while he was traveling in Asia. He was prolific, publishing regular magazine and newspaper articles as well as book after book of adventure travel, including A Beachcomber in the Orient (1923); A Gringo in Manana-Land (1924); and A Tropical Tramp with the Tourists (1925).
In between his frequent trips, Foster would return to New York for a few weeks or a few months, and it was on one of these longer stays in 1925-1926 that he co-authored his only theater drama, Savages Under the Skin produced in 1927. During that extended stay, he also edited a guidebook to South America.
But "wanderlust" always seemed to grip Foster as these visits lengthened, and he was soon off again to new tropical venues, producing A Vagabond in Fiji in 1927; Combing the Caribbees (1929); and A Vagabond in the Barbary (1930).
Although his books are written with almost a moralistic tone, there is no doubt that Harry Foster was an expert on the red light districts of every country he visited, often working in dives as a piano player (a skill he apparently learned at Newton) and that he may have taken the dictum of "work hard, play harder" as his personal goal.
What shouldn't be overlooked, however, is the incomparable picture of everyday people in a post-war world that Foster's travelogues present. Although he allows little of his own character to be available to the reader, he paints generous and interesting portraits of the people he meets and the places he visits. The life of hard travel caught up with Harry Foster, though, and he died, unmarried, at just age 36. In those 36 years, however, he logged enough adventure for three lifetimes.
Title: A Beachcomber in the Orient
Author: Harry L. Foster
Publisher: Dixon-Price Publishing
Mechanicals: 6x9 - trade paperback
ISBN-10: 1-929516-09-6
ISBN-13: 978-1-929516-09-4
Price: U.S. $17.99