For the younger generation he is the father of Louis. For the oldies he is the best travel author in the world. Actually he is both. He is a typical loner who loves to travel his own way and doesn’t like advice or rules from others. That makes him sometimes cynical, but always honest and open. If something resembles a tourist trap, he will avoid it or just say it isn’t worth it.

Several of his books have found their way on my bookshelves, also some of his fiction. Not bad either, but I certainly prefer his travel books. This story starts on a group journey from London through Paris, Berlin and Moscow towards Mongolia, the author already could have written a whole book about his trip and his fellow passengers before he actually enters China on page 66.

Theroux takes time to get to know a destination. He is not there to write an article, to see some highlights; he is there to understand a place, to get a feel for the country. This to me is the essence of travelling. Theroux will never be a tourist; he is the ultimate traveller. He even seems to read a bit of the language. Language is an important part of communication, to me an inevitable part. This is also the main reason that I have not travelled a lot in Asia. I love to be able to talk to locals in their own lingo. I can’t do that in bad English.

Therefore I’m quite pleased that Theroux does travel there, giving me the opportunity as an armchair traveller to follow his expedition through a country that is not high on my to-do list. China is a world on its own; it is quite difficult to say anything that goes for the entire country. The differences between city and country, between north and south, between east and west are huge.

Often did I return to page 10/11 to have a quick glance on the map, to see where Theroux was at the time. I like him travelling by train, as it does give the book more depth, it tells me a lot more about the Chinese compared to taking flights within the country.

Even though it took me ages to read the nearly 500 pages of this book, the book doesn’t get boring. It does get confusing at times though, but that is mainly because of my lack of knowledge before reading this book. There are cities in China bigger than most big cities I know, yet even though a few million people live there, I had never heard of the place and, dare admitting it, have since forgotten the name again.

Theroux is cynical at times, especially as he encounters the lack of liberty he likes. He gets chaperoned and is incredibly annoyed by that. I can imagine as well. Not sure how these days travelling in China goes, though in the eighties when he wrote this volume, the world had a completely different look, the political climate was a bit different from what we know these days.

Yet, even given the troubles he encounters wherever he goes, he makes the most of it and manages to get to know big parts of the country. His eye for detail, a great memory, everything he notes must be jotted down soon afterwards, makes this book a great read. I have thoroughly enjoyed reading it and hopefully will read many more travel book by Paul Theroux.

Quote: “Wanneer een land brulde dat het tot de laatste druppel bloed zou vechten, betekende dat meestal dat het op het punt stond zich over te geven; en in China kon je over het algemeen niets als waar beschouwen totdat het onkend was. Alles wat officieel ontkend werd, was waarschijnlijk waar.”

Quote: “When a country screams that it would fight until the last drop of blood, most of the time this means that it was at the point of surrender; in China nothing could be considered the truth until it had been denied. Everything that was officially denied was probably true.” (p. 136)

Noted travel writer Theroux traveled through China by train in the 1980s, after Mao's Cultural Revolution. Having been there during the Cultural Revolution, he was able to make comparisons. Much had changed. Yet he was still monitored, accompanied, followed, by government officials.

Travel was not particularly easy or comfortable on most of the trips. Accommodations were often sketchy. The Chinese disregard for the lives of other animals was prominently displayed - but he notes that the peasants most responsible for using animals any way they could were themselves in not much different circumstances. China's people embraced capitalism but did not call it that.

One of the more interesting parts of the book came near the end, when Theroux visited Tibet. Long under the thumb of the Chinese, the Tibetans were experienced in resistance, continuing to work and live as they always had regardless of pressure. The area is remote, cut off, difficult to visit, yet stunningly beautiful. Theroux endured a heart-stopping trek by car because there were no trains.

Insightful, thoughtful, intelligently written, even many years later this book is worth reading. ( )

Very dated. He likes emptiness. Rushed to get out of cities like Peking. ( )

Theroux spent a massive amount of time in the 1980s travelling around the People's Republic, and the result is this enormously readable, entertaining, and informative book. I was worried that, after a few hundred pages, my appetite for his travelogue would begin to dim, but in fact the opposite happened. He is so insightfully critical that every page seemed to hold something new, and the fact that he was in-country when the Tiananmen Square protests were staged says much about the resoluteness of his character. ( )

This book about Paul Theroux's travels by train through China was written 20 years ago. Although this trip was before the Tiananmen Square massacre, Theroux did see and hear about some student and worker protests. China was definitely going through a process of change at this time. Deng Xiaoping had brought in many reforms and Theroux witnessed that almost everywhere he went. And he went into many corners of that vast land that North Americans rarely see. Two things from this book stand out for me: a) just how excessive the Cultural Revolution was during Mao's time and b) twenty years is just a blink of an eye in Chinese history.

Theroux ended his trip in Tibet. This is one of the last paragraphs in the book:

You have to see Tibet to understand China. And anyone apologetic or sentimental about Chinese reform has to reckon with Tibet as a reminder of how harsh, how tenacious and materialistic, how insensitive the Chinese can be. They actually believe this is progress.

Twenty years later China is still insensitive about Tibet as the world has seen by the reaction to Tibetan protests about the Olympics. I didn't watch any of the Beijing Olympics, primarily because we were on holiday for that time and had no access to TV. But I don't think even if I had been home that I would have watched because I objected to the Olympics going to China with no call for reforms.

I think this is only the second book of Theroux's that I have read. At least, I only recall reading The Mosquito Coast many years ago. I think I prefer Theroux as a nonfiction writer and I intend to read some of his other travel writing. ( )