Over 97 short chapters and 250+ pages, Chatwin sketches his travels around the Patagonia area of Argentina and Chile and area seems the best way to describe it….This is a desolate terrain and also seems out of time as well as Chatwin is constantly going backwards in time to explore the past of this region.
Chatwin is full of stories, this is a travelogue written by an inveterate gossip and it makes for an entertaining read….There are stories of mutinies, ancient and harrowing sea travels, Welsh, Scottish, German and other pioneers to this region, there’s even several brushes to cryptozoology or the study of unknown creatures.
This is not the best travel book I’ve ever read, the level of detail involving language and other origins of culture are missing as is any socio-political understanding-There is even a scene where Chatwin seems to sympathize with the overthrow of Salvadore Allende through a conversation with an elderly woman of a fascist bent.
However, it is wildly entertaining, his historical anecdotes are an education themselves and one reads the short chapters waiting for the next with anticipation….His short punchy sentences convey an incredible amount of detail….That’s his secret weapon-his eye for detail….Perhaps his experience working at Sotheby’s gave Chatwin the eye for any odd little scene that is the gift of a good writer fiction or non-fiction.
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