More about the countries between Patagonia and Boston than Patagonia. Still an interesting read. Theroux's usual dour wit. ( )

One of the best travel books I have ever read. Paul Theroux is just a great writer. Nice account of his journey, which was not at all a pleasant holiday, more the contrary. I will certainly read another book by him. ( )

I've been finished with this book for over a month now and have been slowly ... very slowly ... writing down my thoughts on it. If you're a bottom line man, and I know at heart, you are :), Paul Theroux's The Old Patagonian Express is a good read. For what makes it worth a look, read on.

I started to read Paul Theroux's The Old Patagonian Express: By Train Through the Americas (Mariner 1979) because I immediately liked his voice as a writer. Once into the book, I was charmed by Theroux's descriptions, by his occasional grumpiness, and by his rather sardonic wit, so I suggested the book to a couple of my friends. One friend read the first page of the introduction and finding Theroux pretentious, opted to put it back down again. I know the other friend at least started to read the book, but I haven't heard from her since, despite my having left a couple of messages for her, leading me to imagine that she'd either hopped a train herself or really hated Theroux and was no longer speaking to me (I've since learned that she's been in New York and Pittsburgh, which is a whole 'nother story).
As for the friend who put the book down, I've read reviews of Theroux that allude to a pretentious tone or attitude, but after completing The Old Patagonian Express and getting about half way through The Great Railway Bazaar: By Train Through Asia, Theroux's work that preceded Patagonia by 4 years, I haven't found anything that I would interpret as overly-affected. At times the division between culture and/or language is obvious and Theroux sometimes becomes a kind of interpreter of the division, during which points, I suppose, he could be seen as committing the crime he describes in the introduction that made my friend put the book down. The objectionable bit was Theroux's dismissal of the way some travel narrators paint themselves as heroes of a "[q]uest … full of liberties." But then again, I couldn't say if there are liberties in Theroux's book—what I have found, primarily, is a writer who looks to the culture to inform and explain the landscape before him as well as someone who finds amusement in the absurd.
In one succinct passage, Theroux describes his border crossing from Guatemala to El Salvador: "The border was a shed. A boy in his sports shirt stamped my passport and demanded money. He asked me if I was carrying any drugs. I said no. What do I do now? I asked him. You go up the road, he said. There you will find another house. That is El Salvador" (127). It is while he is in El Salvador that Theroux goes to a football match between El Salvador and Mexico, during which he approaches his depiction of the match and its 45,000 spectators as " a model of Salvadorean society," complete with the acts of frustration and contempt committed at every level: national, social and individual. At another point, while in Bogatá, Theroux stops to purchase a poster, his choices ranging from posters of political figures whose visages seem to be a blend of Bolívar, Christ, and Che Guevara to posters of Hollywood movie stars to posters of cartoon characters. Theroux describes his choice as "the best of the bunch. It showed Christ on the cross, but he had managed to pull his hand away from one nail, and still hanging crucified but with his free arm around the shoulder of a praying guerrilla fighter, Christ was saying, 'I also was persecuted, my determined guerrilla'" (249).

By far, my favorite section of the book, in a book with many highly enjoyable sections, was Theroux's time in Buenes Aires during which he is summoned to meet and subsequently spends several days visiting with and reading to Jorge Luis Borges, who Theroux says has "the fussy precision of a chemist" (364). Through the narrative of his experiences, for me, Theroux delivers on what he says is his purpose in traveling and in writing about traveling: he delivers a book that gives pleasure; it is something to enjoy. ( )

America > Description and travel/Railroad travel > America/Theroux, Paul > Travel > America

I was disappointed by this book as it wasn't so much a description of where he went but who he talked to. (I've even heard doubt that his conversations are all true.) What he did mention about the places he went was all complaints. I suppose I took offense because I have lived in or near many of those places for more than 20 years. I've traveled in the opposite direction he did from Buenos Aires to Quito by bus and had a fantastic trip--even with 3 teenagers along! The two train rides I've had, he missed due to strikes in Peru. We experiences strikes, too, but found it an adventure! Perhaps he should have taken his wife and children along and would have enjoyed it more than leaving them behind for three months.

I must say though, there is no doubt he is an excellent writer. Wish I could think of similes like he does! ( )