Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #155505 in Books
• Published on: 1998-11-28
• Binding: Paperback
• 384 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
This is the last of Bruce Chatwin's works to be published while he was still alive (he penned the introduction in 1988, a few months before he died). It's a collection of Chatwin gems--profiles, essays, and travel stories that span the world, from trekking in Nepal and sailing down the Volga to working on a film with Werner Herzog in Ghana and travelling with Indira Gandhi in India. Chatwin excels, as usual, in the finely honed tale.

Synopsis
In this collection of profiles, essays and travel stories, Chatwin takes us to Benin, where he is arrested as a mercenary during a coup; to Boston to meet an LSD guru who believes he is Christ; to India with Indira Gandhi when she attempted a political comeback in 1978; and to Nepal where he reminds us that 'Man's real home is not a house, but the Road, and that life itself is a journey to be walked on foot.

From the Publisher
Bruce Chatwin was, in his life as in his art, forever in search of the extraordinary, the exotic and the unexpected.

Customer Reviews

Fascinating combination of travel experiences and erudition
In an effort to leave a testifying legacy of his memories and mesmerizing knowledge, Mr Chatwin shares with the reader a careful selection of his numerous travels and adventures, which lead us with him to the beautiful and the bizarre.
The stories are cleverly intertwined with recollections of his encounters with key contemporary thinkers and personalities.
This gives him a platform to also reveal his vast erudition and to touch on cultural and philosophical reflections.
He may sometimes verge on a certain intellectual arrogance, but one can only forgive the precise writer and the well-travelled thinker.
My favourite story? His encounter with Andre Malraux. How about yours?

Wonderful
A number of delightful short stories from one of our most erudite, charming and complex writers penned shortly before he died so tragically. Chatwin's immense spirit and unflagging interest in the World around him leap from the pages.