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"The Old Patagonian Express" is the third book I have read by the lauded traveler, Paul Theroux. Sick of the winter cold while writing in his childhood home of Medford, Massachusetts, Theroux got the idea to travel in an unbroken line on train from there down to Patagonia, just for the sake of doing it. As he comments early on in the book, many travel narratives have someone starting at the destination while saying nothing of how they got there, and this book would be about how he got there rather than about "there". Being the kind of traveler who prefers buses and cars so I can see what happens between here and there, I knew exactly what he meant. I, too, have read travel narratives where someone from San Francisco or London or Toronto jumps into telling me about hacking through the jungles of Borneo or haggling with a vendor in Beijing or describing a tea ceremony in Kyoto. And I have wondered about the journey there: was everyone that boring to deal with that you couldn't have written about the guy at customs or people in the cafeteria at the airport, or the woman with two kids sitting next to you on the plane? To me, the journey has always been at least part of the travel, so right off the bat I could relate to him as a character in the book. Portraying himself as a character in a novel is how Theroux proceeds through this work. A prolific novelist as well as a travel writer, Theroux uses literary devices such as characterizing the people around him to create a narrative in places where not much is going on, such as in the case of Mr. Thornberry in Costa Rica. Theroux's character of himself is that of the remote observer, as he chooses not to engage himself too deeply in any encounter he has on the trains he rides. It is only when Theroux gets off the train in Buenos Aires and has an extensive encounter with the Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges that he becomes more engaged in a relationship with any of his characters. But Borges seems separate from most of the narrative, and in a sense, he is, because he is not a person whom Theroux meets on a train. In my opinion, this detachment that Theroux employs makes for better writing, because his remoteness from any one encounter enables him to interact with many different people. This is instead of his relaying a personal relationship with only one person, which becomes the story line instead of the experience of travel. Citing the oft repeated maxim of travel allowing to be whoever you want, Theroux tells people he is a geography teacher on holiday instead of saying he is a writer, and he is remote about his ultimate goal of reaching Patagonia by rail. While seemingly dishonest to the pure-hearted, this prevents two things that seem logical enough if followed to conclusion: people embellishing their histories just to sound more colorful in a book, as well as turning their dialogue with the author into commentary on his itinerary, which in both cases would have probably yielded redundant dialogue. In this way, Theroux can remain removed from the storyline without avoiding it completely, a masterful technique that enables him to write a rich story of which he is not always the protagonist. Because of this method, Theroux yields many colorful and memorable encounters: a militant Buddhist raw-foodist, a woman from the American Southwest who can't get enough of his New England accent, an anecdote of how one shouldn't talk about others in a foreign language in front of their faces because you never know who understands, an acrid account of how aid-provided birth control seems to be used in El Salvador, and woman who uses men, including the author, as pillows to rest upon while traveling. Others have conversations to feel Theroux out, but though it is certain they have some impression of the author which obviously can't be inferred, Theroux manages to draw out many people without trying to be over-friendly and is able to draw a composite of almost everyone he meets. As with his other writings, Theroux doesn't sugar-coat his experiences of what he encounters. Which, to me, makes for a very realistic account. I can't see how one would wax philosophical in a Wordsworthian way if he or she was suffering from altitude sickness, was hungry, or feeling disorientated. Theroux's descriptions of travel seem to be more realistic than accounts that leave the bad parts out and only soliloquize on how wonderful the scenery is and how noble the savage is. Travel is ultimately intended as a strange experience that takes a person out of one's comfort zone, and Theroux's narrative reflects this universal reality. To me, the accounts that are rosy and posy make me wonder if I'm doing something wrong when I wonder to myself on travels, what the heck am I doing here, I should have stayed home. Theroux's accounts of discomfort, irritability, and vulnerability reflect to me that these experiences are just part of a traveler's journey. They are just something to get through like the altitude sickness and train delays that Theroux weathered in order to finish the sojourn that was begun. "The Old Patagonian Express" is the name of the last train that Theroux takes as he reaches the Patagonian desert. Written in the late seventies, many of the political realities he describes are outdated, but it is still a descriptive narrative of a most unusual journey. It is a story of how to get from here to there and everything that is entailed with it. The journey, with all its hardships, is part of the travel. In the case of the maxim, it is not the destination, but the journey that counts, this is what this book is about. It stays true to its message and clear about why it was undertaken, and in this story of how to get from here to there, Paul Theroux is a master storyteller. |
