In one of many meditations on wandering in Bruce Chatwinâ??s 1986 novel-cum-travelogue The Songlines, the travel writer challenges the notion that real asceticism can be found only in monastic life. â??The founders of monastic rule,â? he argues, â??were forever devising techniques for quelling wanderlust in their novices. â??A monk out of his cell,â?? said St. Anthony, â??is like a fish out of water.â?? Yet Christ and the Apostles walked their journeys through the hills of Palestine.â? For Chatwin, traveling is not merely a spiritual actâ??it is the selfâ??s purest expression.
Of course, Chatwin (1940â??1989)â??one of the twentieth centuryâ??s most noted fabulistsâ??hardly seems a likely transmitter of spiritual truth. Chatwinâ??s travel writing, which includes such classics as In Patagonia (1977), includes less reportage than fiction: to â??do a Bruce,â? according to Chatwinâ??s early employer Sothebyâ??s, was to spin a fanciful yarn. Chatwin himself gleefully recalled â??counting up the liesâ? in one of his travelogues. Chatwinâ??s approach to travel writing was to consider the worlds he traveledâ??the Australian Outback, the wilds of South Americaâ??as raw material: a canvas on which to paint the story of himself.
Read Full Article »