Autonauts of the Cosmoroute

At once meditative, playful, literary, quirky, erotic, imaginative, and even modestly paranoic, this delightful book chronicles a journey Cortázar and Dunlop made in May and June of 1982 along the autoroute from Paris to Marseille stopping at every rest stop at the rate of two per day. Why did they do this? Initially, the idea came to them as a way to escape the responsibilities, especially phone calls and mail, that confronted them in Paris, and also perhaps a certain psychological gloom, but as ideas will, it evolved, and they came to see it as a an expedition inspired by those of the early European explorers and resolved to scientifically document their observations. They traveled in their VW van, nicknamed Fafner the dragon, which show more was outfitted with a refrigerator and a jerry can of water, along with other supplies including food, liquor, books. and cassette tapes. They arranged for a few friends to meet them along the way for companionship and fresh food (they also ate occasionally in restaurants at the rest stops and stayed overnight in hotels at the stops).

What was perhaps most surprising to me is how frequent the rest stops on this highway are. In the logs that detail each day -- times of arising and travel, as well as of other interesting events, information about each rest stop, their meals, the temperature and weather, etc. -- it seems to take about 15 minutes to get from one rest area to another. Thus, they spent most of their time in rest areas, not on the autoroute. This gave them ample time for exploration, reading, writing (they brought two typewriters with them), and enjoying their freedom and the opportunity to be only with each other. In addition to the logs, and the descriptions of what they saw at the rest areas, this book includes forays into fiction, meditations on everything from music to love, visits from imaginary characters, photographs, and illustrations (drawn by Dunlop's son). Every page is both deeply personal and addressed to the reader -- they knew from the beginning that they would write a book about the trip.

Thus their journey was a search for happiness, as well as an exploration of the rest areas. They call each other by their pet names, La Osita (little bear) for her, El Lobo (the wolf) for him, and their affection for each other shines through the writing. At one point they mention a bet two of their friends made about whether they would complete the trip, one hypothesizing that they would squabble and separately return to Paris. Instead, the trip seems to have deepened their love for each other, perhaps (although this isn't clear) knowing that Dunlop was ill and would die, tragically early, the next year, before the book could be completed. While each wrote different sections, it is sometimes difficult to know who wrote what.

In a way, the trip left them suspended in time (thus "timeless" in the subtitle), allowing them the illusion that life, like the autoroute, continues indefinitely. Hence their sadness when they arrived in Marseille and returned to "real" life. Speaking of the deeper meanings some of their friends attempted to hang on the trip upon their return to Paris, Cortázar writes:

"All that dazzled us a bit, but most of all we found it funny, because we'd never conceived nor realized the expedition with underlying intentions. It was a game for a little Bear and a Wolf, and that's what it was for thirty-three wondrous days. Faced with disturbing questions, we said many times that if we'd had those possibilities in mind, the expedition would have been something else, perhaps better or worse but never that advance in happiness and love from which we emerged so fulfilled that nothing, afterwards, even admirable travels and hours of perfect harmony, could surpass that month outside of time, that interior month where we knew for the first and last time what absolute happiness was." pp. 351-352 show less

In the spring of 1982, the Argentinian author Julio Cortázar and his wife Carol Dunlop decide to drive from Paris to Marseille, a 790 km (450 mi) trip, and to write about the trip. This seems simple (and boring) enough, right? However, the master humorist and surrealist and his wife decide to turn this trip into a scientific expedition and exploration of all of the rest stops along the route. They plan to visit two rest stops per day, and there are 70 stops along the way.

After consulting travel diaries by Captain Cook and Marco Polo, and ensuring that they have sufficent supplies to prevent scurvy, Cortázar ('El Lobo') and Dunlop ('La Osita', or 'Little Bear') embark on their epic journey, led by their faithful Volkswagen beetle van show more 'Fafner' ('the dragon').

The 33 day trip is filled with bizarre and hilarious episodes, including a near-fatal encounter with a swarm of carnivorous ants, confrontations with suspicious gendarmes and highway workers, and the constant threats of large trucks and sports cars traveling at impossible speeds. The voyagers also discover a site where witches were tortured and executed, which other travelers naïvely mistake for a children's playground.

In the latter part of the journey, the entries become more introspective and philosophical, and are infused with the love that El Lobo and La Ostia share for each other. A joyful sadness also permeates the last pages, as deceased friends are mourned and loved, and the end of the journey is celebrated with wine and tears.

This travelogue/flight of ideals/love story is unlike anything I've ever read, and, although it drags in a couple of spots, preventing me from giving a five star rating, is highly recommended. show less

Why oh why have I not read this before? Shame on me. This is just immense - a glorious Quixotic adventure, a love story, a paean of praise for slowing down and looking at life completely differently, a celebration of language, of words and of friendship.

Cortazar, I have to admit, is fairly new to me, but already his style and stories have blown me away. This, an account of a 33-day journey made by him and his wife Carol Dunlop from Paris to Marseilles, should be given to everyone you know, to read, to love, to live by.

Unlike anything I've read before. Have I said I enjoyed it? And omg, the last page will break your heart and make your heart soar at the same time. Wonderful, simply wonderful.

What a wonderful book. Part essay, part travelogue with a smattering of fiction, it's an indescribable blend of humor, sadness, quirk and love. Author Julio Cortázar cooked up a plan with his second wife Carol Dunlop to drive from Paris to Marseilles in their VW bus nicknamed Fafner, the dragon. The catch is, they stopped at every single rest-stop along the way at the count of two per day, sleeping over night at the second one. This book chronicles their thoughts and notes throughout the journey. It really is a wonderful book, demonstrating how despite such odd circumstances Cortázar and Dunlop found great joy escaping the world, being not utterly isolated but separated from their responsibilities and obligations. Instead, they show more focused on each other, on reading, writing and observing.

Their writing covers great terrain--despite the modest terrain they are actually covering in the VW--from the philosophical to the poetic, to the mundane and pseudo-scientific. Light-hearted humor arises when they treat the journey "scientifically" with a daily "travel log" in which they indicate times of departure, weather, what they ate, where the bus was parked (facing N.W.N, for example), and so on. There was also humor in a certain ironic/exaggerated paranoia they exhibit as if their journey is threatened at times by the political powers-that-be because Cortázar was not only a writer but a political activist. As, for example, a rest area was "closed" to sabotage their journey.

Love, and the joy of their togetherness, was a major theme expressed throughout the story. Physical and emotional love. Their affection is so gentle and so poetic, reading it is near meditative in quality. Which makes it all the more tragic to read the concluding chapter where Cortázar notes how soon after the journey was completed, Dunlop died of an illness she had been battling. It was so sad, given their tremendous affection. And just a couple years later, Cortázar dies!

In the end, they summarize the journey, as unintentionally a Zen expedition. They set off not knowing what they would find and what they found was the beauty of existence even in the most absurd of situations. Touring rest areas.

The only aspect of the story that didn't sit well with me was the personification of Fafner, the VW bus. Admittedly, in my own past, I did briefly personify the car I had in college, a '72 Dodge Dart that my friend Dave Fagan dubbed the Death Sled. I accused said vehicle of attempting to kill me on several occasions. Its attacks included but were not limited to: a steering system that pulled to the left, windshield wipers that gave out in the middle of a torrential downpour whilst driving from Cleveland to Columbus, Ohio, and scalding burns on the thighs occasioned by the vinyl bench seat, which could achieve temperatures that could smelt iron if left exposed to direct sunlight. But despite my own experience with personifying vehicles in my youth, I was left somewhat uncomfortable with affection expressed for a motor vehicle as charmingly and innocently as it was expressed. And with no disrespect intended to the legacy of this book or Cortázar, reading their descriptions caused me to reflect on the death penalty. You see, in the U.S., the death penalty is still legal despite the immorality of the state killing a prisoner. But a corporation can't seem to die no matter the heinous crimes it commits. No matter whom it kills or what laws it breaks. A few individuals on rare occasions can be put in jail for fraud they commit within a corporation, but the corporation goes on. It rebrands. And over time, people forget. A generation later, a brand that was once conservative can become hip. A brand that once poisoned an ocean, can be forgiven. Volkswagen was, as you can learn from a quick trip to Wikipedia, founded by the Nazi Party. And Volkswagen's formative years were spent making all sorts of vehicles for the war effort. Hitler himself took a person interest in the success of Volkswagen. Rather ironic how the VW bus and the VW beetle became symbols of the hippie movement in the sixties, isn't it? Not only ironic, but it demonstrates how brands and Capitalism can swallow up idealism and sell it back to you. Levis is one of the current brands that is trying to advertise in the spirit of the Occupy movement. As if, somehow, wearing Levis makes you more free, more independent minded and more creative. Brands want us to personify their products in order to develop an emotional relationship with them and choose to purchase them again. Generating emotion in advertising is a core trick to drive sales. A trick that often has nothing whatsoever to do with the product itself. Think of Coke. Or Pepsi. And Cortazar being an ardent Socialist, I couldn't help but wonder why he allowed himself to be seduced by this product. So...I couldn't help but not find emotional affection for a VW bus as less charming than it was intended to be.

At any rate, this is wholly my own reaction to this aspect of the book and despite the digression it sent me off in my own mind, I can none-the-less whole-heartedly recommend this book. show less

La Osita and el Lobo, armed with the caps of mushrooms and cuneiforms forming nightvisions by sidetracked autobahns, carrying only the sin of excess imagination, travel en route of stopped time, which is a form of brussel sprouts, as by re-routing scientific observations about skylarks at rest while gliding in rest areas, they also find a way of being explorers like ancient ships do, clear to the back of the fog, or simply, with Fafner, their VW, sounding out the silences between trucks, like the hollow in the mouth of the waves that break against it, while headlights illuminate the interior soundtrack of a jellyfish, and by morn the "progress" which is a mourning of movement, of "passing", where the freeway becomes a habit that stings show more of peculiarity, each dream in its acuity bringing itself into deeper relief, like the lines in a face showing only memories, though we live in the 21st century, though we can still write a yellow book of celebration, though we can be anachronistic to the core, where a longing lurks within all its joy.

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All corny prosifying aside, and without recapping the content of the book (read the other GR reviews for that, they're good), I just want to say that there is a kind of subtext to this whole book of joy... that even though I believe their joy is genuine, I also feel like there is something forced about it. Not that they are lying, but that there is something they are fighting against, both in the world and within themselves perhaps, and that for this they must use all their imaginations. Something about this book, though deceptively casual and without consequence and completely joyful, is also kind of heavy with the weight of the real world. show less

It is not possible that you have read anything else like this book. Unless you are cold-hearted, miserable and vicious, it is likely that you will embrace it, wish it to continue indefinitely and then admire its moving and unexpected conclusion. Two poetic and imaginative people, very much in love with one another, document a journey from Paris to Marseille that moves through two highway rest stops per day. The travelogue, the photographs, and the ruminations are all made to glow by the intensity and playfulness of Cortazar and Dunlop's relationship and literary talent. Give this book to people you love.

Magic and unique hymn of love;
mischievous and funny observations.
The book may seem a bit too lengthy, but it's understandable as the authors obviously were happy to prolong their unheard-of trip along the autoroute.
The book's getting sadder and even tragic closer to the end, given the circumstances (Carol's death, Julio's illness and pain of loss...)