The difference between travel writing as fiction is the difference between recording what the eye sees and discovering what the imagination knows.… — Paul Theroux Copy Share Image
“And yet on that bench at Jacobacci, I was glad I had left everyone else behind. Although this was a town with… — Paul Theroux Copy Share Image
“A slow feeling of gathering sadness as each familiar place flashes by the window and disappears and becomes part of the past.… — Paul Theroux Copy Share Image
“But: all journeys were return journeys. The farther one traveled, the nakeder one got, until, towards the end, ceasing to be animated… — Paul Theroux Copy Share Image
Unless there is a strong sense of place there is no travel writing, but it need not come from topographical description; dialogue… — Paul Theroux Copy Share Image
“You think of travelers as bold, but our guilty secret is that travel is one of the laziest ways on earth of… — Paul Theroux Copy Share Image
I feel as if my mission is to write, to see, to observe, and I feel lazy if I'm not reaching conclusions. I feel… — Paul Theroux Copy Share Image
The larger an English industry was, the more likely it was to go bankrupt, because the English were not naturally corporate people; they disliked… — Paul Theroux Copy Share Image
Maine out of season is unmistakably a great destination: hospitable, good-humored, plenty of elbow room, short days, dark nights of crackling ice crystals. — Paul Theroux Copy Share Image
You can't write about a friend, you can only write about a former friend. — Paul Theroux Copy Share Image
“sightseeing, an activity that delights the truly idle because it seems so much like scholarship, gawping and eavesdropping on antiquity, flattering oneself with the… — Paul Theroux Copy Share Image
Tourists who go to Africa have more of a traditional experience than Africans do. A tourist goes on safari; Africans don't. — Paul Theroux Copy Share Image
In a way, Che Guevara's fate was far worse than Simon Bolivar's. Guevara's collapse was complete: his intentions were forgotten, but his style was… — Paul Theroux Copy Share Image
Pain does not create a long-lasting memory, but the memory of luxury exerts itself for ever. — Paul Theroux Copy Share Image
