Travel does not suit all. There are many remedies for the traveler's bodily discomfort. But what of the excruciating ennui of the endless hours in transit?
Though some find Paul Theroux a bitter pill to swallow, I put him first on any list of books to pack for a journey. To those who protest, I retort "suck it up!" Like it or not, a Theroux will thoroughly cure mental malnutrition.
Paul maintains “If you’re really suffering, then you’re travelling”. In parts of India, to travel is to 'safar'.
However, the French insist that Les voyages forment la jeunesse. Former is to train and, roughly speaking, travel can train or broaden the mind. Not only for the young. And not only on a train. A book can be a journey that educates or trains the brain.
If you have any doubt about the efficacy of the French prescription, make doubly sure by traveling with a Theroux or two. Any one of his books is a mini education. A low cost crash course in English literature and more.
With Kindle and kin, we can reduce the suffering of trotting the globe toting bulky books. Load those with a Theroux or more and, by the end of the trip, you are bound to have more finish about you than when you embarked.
Has the author not quickly introduced you to some giants in English literature? If you end up checking out Maugham, or Greene alone, you're already slightly erudite. Take it a step further. Read a Maugham, and/or a Greene and, voilà, you're a pundit of sorts. Should you complete a part of the body of works output by Theroux, you are a scholar! One of the qualities of a good book is that it educates.
We have spoken of education. And of suffering. In the context of travel. In the context of travel writing - of all writing - it is true that there are those to whom reading good writing seems a pain. In Paul Theroux, this peculiar quality of excellence - to be, almost instinctively, despised for that virtue - is tragically wedded to his signature style: a tendency to whine and crib. This has brought upon him all manner of attack.
While everyone is welcome to an opinion, I do not see why a book has to be ingratiating. Disney and Cerelac did a huge disservice to humankind by feeding us bland pap. And heaps of sugar always seemed to help. No wonder, then, that besides rotten teeth, there now exists a kind of caries of the mind.
However, whining and cribbing are rarely palatable by themselves. It's the erudition Theroux wields. And, if one permits oneself, then I am sure a book or two of his will undo the harm of years of a diet of soppy reading.
More than from formal education, I learned so much by chancing to be near people whose speech is marvelous with information. They are like books. They tell you of things, situate them in time, take you into their histories and geographies. A whole flora and fauna might sprout around their narrations. Such people are rare to find. Books are always there.
Daily life, it is claimed, robs time to read. At one time, convalescence was considered time to catch up on classics. Like bed rest, travel too constrains us. And one can use that time to train the mind. We can and should use journeys to 'suffer' gladly the pains of some more substantial reading. What better than a Theroux? Here is an attempt to glimpse the journey of this 'teacher' via his travel books.
The article will also tell you how it all began.
But first, who is Paul Theroux?
If you are not used to this author or genre, then you might want to begin with a curated collection of travel writings by him and other famous names in the game:
There exist more examples of such anthologies of his works, sometimes supplemented by pieces from others.
As for his first travel book, there is some confusion. Is it this or another?
Then, there's the follow-up - somewhat the same route at twice the age he was for the first adventure. The author has done a similar exercise for other regions including Africa. In the course of this new pilgrimage he meets Orhan Pamuk, Arthur C. Clarke and Haruki Murakami, among others! Reason enough to grab a copy.
As for the The Old Patagonian Express, it appears to drive home his philosophy about travel and suffering:
And then there's the UK or part of it:
Sailing Through China comes next and is the thinnest of the lot. He seems to have at least three books for China.
The 'cruise' down the Yangtze receives, as do the rest of Theroux's works, calumny and praise in equal amounts. For this adventure his travel companions are American millionaires.
Somehow, many a reviewer of Theroux feels compelled to describe how he was clad and it is always vivid:
The Pillars Of Hercules, like many of his books, evokes a mixture of disapproval and grudging admiration if any. However, I have a hunch this would be a precious book for various reasons. The area is a cradle of Western thought. It is a Europe that is not accepted as Europe by the better-off Europeans. Yet it is a dream holiday destination.
Now, when we speak of Theroux, we have to mention three things: travel, literature and Naipaul. And, in fact, there is more than one whole Theroux devoted to V S Naipaul. Given the drama of their relationship I lust for Sir Vidia's Shadow.
The excerpts below evidence the worth of the book:
There is more in that article which proves that Theroux deserves to be read even if his writing makes one go red in the face.
Theroux has really gone and done it in the Dark Star Safari. He's hurt sentiments. The Guardian's reviewer is seriously miffed:
For me, on the other side of the fence, Theroux gets my vote over that of any aid worker. Hypocrisy and lies are hard to digest and charity after you bomb people is inedible.
The mood continues with The Last Train to Zona Verde
I have to conclude this account of Paul Theroux's travel writings with confessing that Deep South was a bumpy ride for me. Yet, I'm sure I would not deny it a place in my library, had I the money to buy, house and honour all the books and authors that I consider of worth.
Though some find Paul Theroux a bitter pill to swallow, I put him first on any list of books to pack for a journey. To those who protest, I retort "suck it up!" Like it or not, a Theroux will thoroughly cure mental malnutrition.
Paul maintains “If you’re really suffering, then you’re travelling”. In parts of India, to travel is to 'safar'.
However, the French insist that Les voyages forment la jeunesse. Former is to train and, roughly speaking, travel can train or broaden the mind. Not only for the young. And not only on a train. A book can be a journey that educates or trains the brain.
If you have any doubt about the efficacy of the French prescription, make doubly sure by traveling with a Theroux or two. Any one of his books is a mini education. A low cost crash course in English literature and more.
With Kindle and kin, we can reduce the suffering of trotting the globe toting bulky books. Load those with a Theroux or more and, by the end of the trip, you are bound to have more finish about you than when you embarked.
... when I first came to Bangkok, I was looking for Somerset Maugham’s Bangkok, Noel Coward’s Bangkok, Graham Greene’s Bangkok. But the Bangkok that I saw in ’68 was American servicemen’s Bangkok. It was an American soldier’s R and R Mecca, which was 10 times more interesting than the Bangkok of the books...
We have spoken of education. And of suffering. In the context of travel. In the context of travel writing - of all writing - it is true that there are those to whom reading good writing seems a pain. In Paul Theroux, this peculiar quality of excellence - to be, almost instinctively, despised for that virtue - is tragically wedded to his signature style: a tendency to whine and crib. This has brought upon him all manner of attack.
... the author himself comes across as a stupid, rude and horrible person who abuses random people, makes snide remarks, plays practical jokes on helpful locals, and in general appears quite slap-worthy.
While everyone is welcome to an opinion, I do not see why a book has to be ingratiating. Disney and Cerelac did a huge disservice to humankind by feeding us bland pap. And heaps of sugar always seemed to help. No wonder, then, that besides rotten teeth, there now exists a kind of caries of the mind.
However, whining and cribbing are rarely palatable by themselves. It's the erudition Theroux wields. And, if one permits oneself, then I am sure a book or two of his will undo the harm of years of a diet of soppy reading.
More than from formal education, I learned so much by chancing to be near people whose speech is marvelous with information. They are like books. They tell you of things, situate them in time, take you into their histories and geographies. A whole flora and fauna might sprout around their narrations. Such people are rare to find. Books are always there.
Daily life, it is claimed, robs time to read. At one time, convalescence was considered time to catch up on classics. Like bed rest, travel too constrains us. And one can use that time to train the mind. We can and should use journeys to 'suffer' gladly the pains of some more substantial reading. What better than a Theroux? Here is an attempt to glimpse the journey of this 'teacher' via his travel books.
As a teacher in Singapore in the 1960s I took trains to Malaysia and Thailand, and within Burma and Indonesia.
The article will also tell you how it all began.
But first, who is Paul Theroux?
HE'S a towering author with at least 15 travel books and 30 novels and collections of short stories stacked in tottering piles on his curriculum vitae. He has roamed the remoter parts of the world, zigzagging through Africa, Asia, the Americas, Europe and Australia. Harrison Ford and Sigourney Weaver have starred in movie adaptations of his books. He had a longstanding friendship, then a bitter falling out (which he mercilessly dissected for a book), with Nobel-prize winning author V.S. Naipaul.
Indeed, part of the pleasure of reading Theroux is catching up on whom he is reading in turn: Is it the acerbic Argentine Jorge Luis Borges, master of labyrinthine travels? The mysterious Orientalist Charles Montagu Doughty, chronicler of the Bedouin camps of Arabia? Or his lifelong frenemy, V. S. Naipaul, a familiar of Africa, India, the Caribbean, and so many other Therouvian destinations? The reading list stretches over the horizon.
There exist more examples of such anthologies of his works, sometimes supplemented by pieces from others.
extensive collection of his shorter pieces
Paul Theroux's The Great Railway Bazaar is a carefully wrought literary artefact. It is a travelogue – the account of a journey by train from Britain across Asia – but, while it offers itself as a true record, it has a narrative structure as carefully contrived as any novel. As he crosses India, Theroux is reading James Joyce's Exiles, and his own account, like Joyce's narrative, concentrates on incidental episodes while omitting many of the central "facts" of the story.
And it all began when
whimsically Paul Theroux kisses his wife good-by and sets off on a three-month parabolic trip around Asia because he likes trains. "Ever since childhood, when I lived within earshot of the Boston and Maine, I have seldom heard a train go by and not wished I was on it." It was his intention, he says, "to board every train that chugged into view from Victoria Station in London to Tokyo Central; to take the branch line to Simia, the spur through the Khyber Pass, and the chord line that links Indian Railways with those in Ceylon; the Mandalay Express, the Malaysian Golden Arrow, the locals in Vietnam, and the trains with bewitching names, the Orient Express, the North Star, the Trans-Siberian."
Now, if you still require blandishment, here is an excerpt of an excerpt from the horse's mouth:
The train made its slow circuit of Paris, weaving among the dark buildings and shrieking frseeeeeeeefronnnng into the ears of sleeping women. The Gare de Lyons was alive, with that midnight glamour of bright lights and smoking engines, and across the gleaming tracks the ribbed canvas over one particular train turned it into a caterpillar about to set off and chew a path through France. On the platform arriving passengers were yawning, shambling with fatigue. The porters leaned on luggage carriers and watched people struggling with suitcases. Our car met, and coupled with, the rest of the Direct-Orient Express; that bump slid the compartment doors open and threw me forward into the lap of the lady opposite, surprising her from sleep.
Then, there's the follow-up - somewhat the same route at twice the age he was for the first adventure. The author has done a similar exercise for other regions including Africa. In the course of this new pilgrimage he meets Orhan Pamuk, Arthur C. Clarke and Haruki Murakami, among others! Reason enough to grab a copy.
... a narrative of a masochistic two-month rail journey from his parents' house in Medford, Mass., all the way through Mexico and Central America to the southern tip of South America, the remote and barren Patagonia ...
And he apparently suffers more on this trip - excerpt from above link.
Theroux is crawled over by flies, roaches and rats; he cuts his hand and gets diarrhea so violent that even his British "cement" won't arrest it; he suffers agonies from altitude-sickness crossing the Andes and relieves it only by squirting the contents of an oxygen-filled balloon (sold by a vendor on the train) into his mouth.
Yet he brings the reader his money's worth as educator:
Theroux realizes the magic of walking down a street in Buenos Aires with the blind Borges, "like being led through Alexandria by Cavafy, or through Lahore by Kipling. The city belonged to him, and he had has a hand in inventing it."
''The more I saw of Butlin's, the more it resembled English life. . . . It was England without work - leisure had been overtaken by fatigue and dullwittedness. . . . No one seemed to notice how plain the buildings were, how tussocky the grass was, or that everywhere there was a pervasive sizzle and smell of food frying in hot fat. . . . There was no denying its popularity. It combined the security and equality of prison with the vulgarity of an amusement park.''
Mr. Theroux is never less than readable, and many of his observations are disturbingly to the point. One scene, when his railway carriage of polite, self- effacing English folk is invaded by violent, swearing skinheads, will stick in the memory for a long time. It is exactly the sort of thing that happens often and everybody pretends not to notice. His perception of the kingdom of the sea may be a partial one, and in my view jaundiced, but it makes a stimulating book for all that.
Sailing Through China comes next and is the thinnest of the lot. He seems to have at least three books for China.
The 'cruise' down the Yangtze receives, as do the rest of Theroux's works, calumny and praise in equal amounts. For this adventure his travel companions are American millionaires.
Somehow, many a reviewer of Theroux feels compelled to describe how he was clad and it is always vivid:
Clad in white linen and a flowery shirt, Paul Theroux looked a picture of contentment during a recent speechmaking swing through Bangkok. Two Polynesian-style tattoos designed by the 68-year-old himself curved from an exposed wrist and sockless calve.
Sunrise With Seamonsters was my most recent Theroux and one that I fully relished.
The Imperial Way sounds like a collector's item with excellent photos.
To go by some reviews, Riding The Iron Rooster has little to recommend apart from the pleasures of his style. Somehow, I would still read the book and eat my hat if there were really nothing of literary value in it apart from the writing.
Now, here is a Theroux that people seem to bill and coo about! The Happy Isles Of Oceania is "Possibly his best travel book...an observant and frequently hilarious account of a trip that took him to 51 Pacific Islands." The Internet claims that as a quote from the Time magazine. I'll have one of that, please!
The Imperial Way sounds like a collector's item with excellent photos.
To go by some reviews, Riding The Iron Rooster has little to recommend apart from the pleasures of his style. Somehow, I would still read the book and eat my hat if there were really nothing of literary value in it apart from the writing.
Now, here is a Theroux that people seem to bill and coo about! The Happy Isles Of Oceania is "Possibly his best travel book...an observant and frequently hilarious account of a trip that took him to 51 Pacific Islands." The Internet claims that as a quote from the Time magazine. I'll have one of that, please!
Now, when we speak of Theroux, we have to mention three things: travel, literature and Naipaul. And, in fact, there is more than one whole Theroux devoted to V S Naipaul. Given the drama of their relationship I lust for Sir Vidia's Shadow.
The excerpts below evidence the worth of the book:
The mood, sound and feel of Africa in the 1960s are palpably evoked, and the people Theroux meets there are conjured up with a lively combination of journalistic detail and Dickensian ardor.
There is more in that article which proves that Theroux deserves to be read even if his writing makes one go red in the face.
Theroux has really gone and done it in the Dark Star Safari. He's hurt sentiments. The Guardian's reviewer is seriously miffed:
Throughout the remainder of his account of his trip we are reminded of the uselessness of aid workers and, in particular, the offensive luxury of the vehicles they drive around in. In Malawi we hear of "a white person driving one-handed in his white Save the Children vehicle, talking on a cellphone with music playing loudly - the happiest person in the country". In Tanzania, still in those culpably white cars, they "travel in pairs, in the manner of cultists and Mormon evangelists".And here is Theroux's coup de grâce: "Aid workers in rural Africa are in general, oafish selfdramatising prigs and, often, complete bastards."
For me, on the other side of the fence, Theroux gets my vote over that of any aid worker. Hypocrisy and lies are hard to digest and charity after you bomb people is inedible.
The mood continues with The Last Train to Zona Verde
Theroux has no patience for the “slum tourism” that has mushroomed in Africa, the travelers drawn to “the people of the abyss,” the “poverty porn” taken up enthusiastically by no one so much as the poor themselves. Nor does he approve of safari tourism, which, at the end of the day, is little more than theater. Worse is his opinion of Hollywood humanitarians, the Bonos and Oprahs and Angelina Jolies, who use Africa’s hunger and squalor to burnish their outsize egos. As far as Theroux is concerned, much of the aid dispatched to the continent is harmful, instilling a culture of dependency that discourages investment, retards growth and leaves Africans helpless and infantilized.
I have to conclude this account of Paul Theroux's travel writings with confessing that Deep South was a bumpy ride for me. Yet, I'm sure I would not deny it a place in my library, had I the money to buy, house and honour all the books and authors that I consider of worth.
Paul Theroux is not merely a travel writer. His body of fiction appears larger than that of his non-fiction. All writing, especially good writing, obeys classic rules of story-telling. A good writer also tests mettle by playing with genres and other tools of the trade.
Theroux tells you fascinating things about all sorts of things, places, times, people - literary and otherwise. The job of a good book is to entertain you a whole lot and bulk-educate you painlessly. You can perhaps construct a whole academic course out of some of his books.
And, I might have put my foot in my mouth there. For, to a great many, education spells suffering.
“If you’re really suffering, then you’re travelling”
So, if you are suffering a good book, then it follows that you might be traveling. If that is so, then, according to the French, you are being trained. Even if you're not on a train.
A single book, that is worthwhile, is a priceless journey through time and space. So, do buy a Paul Theroux whether or not you plan to travel.
“If you’re really suffering, then you’re travelling”
So, if you are suffering a good book, then it follows that you might be traveling. If that is so, then, according to the French, you are being trained. Even if you're not on a train.
A single book, that is worthwhile, is a priceless journey through time and space. So, do buy a Paul Theroux whether or not you plan to travel.
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