Under the Sun: The Letters of Bruce Chatwin

by Bruce Chatwin, Nicholas Shakespeare (Compiler), Elizabeth Chatwin (Compiler)

The definitive collection of the letters of the enigmatic writer, providing new perspectives on his extraordinary life. Selected and edited by Elizabeth Chatwin and Nicholas Shakespeare, with an introduction by Elizabeth Chatwin.

"I am most certainly in the mood for writing letters."

Bruce Chatwin is one of the most significant British novelists and travel writers of our time. His books have become modern-day classics which defy categorisation, assimilating elements of fiction, essay, reportage, history and gossip, inspired by and reflecting his incredible journeys. Tragically, Chatwin's compelling narrative voice was cut off just as he had found it. One month before his death he lamented, "There are so many things I want to do." "Bruce had just begun" said his friend, Salman Rushdie, "we saw only the first act". While we shall never know the surprise of his unwritten works, Chatwin left behind a body of writing that is striking for its freshness; an authentic conduit which allows us to return to him and to be a wealth of letters and postcards that he wrote, from his first week at school until shortly before his death at the age of forty-eight. Whether typed on Sotheby's notepaper or hastily scribbled, Chatwin's correspondence reveals more about himself than he was prepared to expose in his books; his health and finances, his literary ambitions and tastes, his uneasiness about his sexual orientation; above all, his lifelong quest for where to live. Written with the verve and sharpness of expression that first marked him out as a writer, Chatwin's letters gives a vivid synopsis of his changing interests and concerns throughout his life.

Comprising material collected over two decades from hundreds of contacts across five continents, Under the Sun is a valuable and illuminating record of one of the greatest and most enigmatic writers of the twentieth century.

Genres: Travel, Biography, Nonfiction, Memoir, Queer, Biography Memoir

560 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2010

About the author

Charles Bruce Chatwin was an English novelist and travel writer. He won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for his novel On the Black Hill (1982).

In 1972, Chatwin interviewed the 93-year-old architect and designer Eileen Gray in her Paris salon, where he noticed a map of the area of South America called Patagonia, which she had painted. "I've always wanted to go there," Bruce told her. "So have I," she replied, "go there for me." Two years later in November 1974, Chatwin flew out to Lima in Peru, and reached Patagonia a month later. When he arrived, he left the newspaper with a telegram: "Have gone to Patagonia." He spent six months in the area, a trip which resulted in the book In Patagonia (1977). This work established his reputation as a travel writer. Later, however, residents in the region contradicted the account of events depicted in Chatwin's book. It was the first time in his career, but not the last, that conversations and characters which Chatwin presented as fact were alleged to have been fictionalised.

Later works included a novel based on the slave trade, The Viceroy of Ouidah, which he researched with extended stays in Benin, West Africa. For The Songlines (1987), a work combining fiction and non-fiction, Chatwin went to Australia. He studied the culture to express how the songs of the Aborigines are a cross between a creation myth, an atlas and an Aboriginal man's personal story. He also related the travelling expressed in The Songlines to his own travels and the long nomadic past of humans. Winner of the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, his novel On the Black Hill (1982) was set closer to home, in the hill farms of the Welsh Borders. It focuses on the relationship between twin brothers, Lewis and Benjamin, who grow up isolated from the course of twentieth century history. Utz (1988), was a novel about the obsession that leads people to collect. Set in Prague, the novel details the life and death of Kaspar Utz, a man obsessed with his collection of Meissen porcelain.

Chatwin was working on a number of new ideas for future novels at the time of his death from AIDS in 1989, including a transcontinental epic, provisionally titled Lydia Livingstone.

Reviews

[Asclepiade · Rating 2 out of 5]

Non so bene onde partire per dire due parole su questa raccolta epistolare di Chatwin; partirò da qualche parte, dove capita, poi le cose verranno da sé: rem tene, verba sequentur, diceva Catone il Censore. Premessa: Chatwin fu uno dei miei amori letterarî giovanili, e di lui credo di aver letto e apprezzato tutto, eccetto Sulla collina nera, mai letto, e questo libro, letto ma non apprezzato: libro che poi non è un’opera postuma, bensì la raccolta delle lettere scritte da Chatwin, con la curatela della vedova e del fido biografo Nicholas Shakespeare. Le stranezze cominciano proprio all’inizio, perché l’introduzione si diffonde sulla fama che aveva acquisito l’autore inglese da vivo, ma che s’è offuscata dopo la sua morte: non mi sembra una cautela molto adatta per introdurre una raccolta di lettere del già famoso, soprattutto perché la circostanza non ha tutta quest’importanza: lo stesso accadde anche al Metastasio e a Moravia, dopotutto; e si tratta di due pezzi da novanta ben più importanti di Chatwin: soprattutto il primo. Poi si va avanti con un commento tutto intessuto di minutaglie biografiche più prossime alla chiacchiera da tinello che al commento su d’un autore defunto da svariati lustri: commento dove giganteggia soprattutto l’orbata consorte, con la sgradevole sensazione però di volersi mettere in primo piano (lei e la sua famiglia) a spese dell’estinto. Un po’ come Pierre Bergé, obietterà qualche malevolo: Bergé tuttavia, rispondo io, lo sapeva fare con una grandeur condita di sovrana sprezzatura, che qua non si vede e non esiste; e poi la vedova Chatwin non è Pierre Bergé. Insomma, non so se per evitare l’agiografia o per una neanche tanto sottile vendetta postuma, dal combinato disposto di epistolario e commento esce un Chatwin dimidiato, anzi, fatto a pezzi: pigro, irresoluto, inconcludente, un po’ scroccone, capriccioso e incostante nelle amicizie, scontento un po’ di tutti, maligno, vagamente antipatico; un poveraccio, insomma, altro che il mitico viaggiatore un po’ dandy, con la bottiglietta di Krug e il vecchio Moleskine nel famoso zaino, al quale, come da queste lettere salta fuori, egli era molto affezionato. Insomma, non riesco a capire che operazione editoriale sia stata questa di stampare le lettere di Chatwin compiangendone la scemata fama e intanto lapidandolo in effigie. Saranno finezze anglosassoni che sfuggono a noi arretrati latini, “gente alla buona” direbbe il Conte Attilio “che non conosce le prime”. D’altro canto, la raccolta non è neppure completa: oltre a tagli redazionali “per evitare le ripetizioni”, è stato tenuto fuori tutto un blocco di lettere (non si sa quante) d’un destinatario che non le ha volute conferire alla massa; chi sia costui, non si sa. Forse un ex-boyfriend del Nostro. A prescindere dalla fedeltà filologica, va riconosciuto che purtroppo i testi sono interessanti e gradevoli da leggere soltanto a sprazzi. Chatwin non era uno scrittore dalla vena immediata e felice: ciò riconosceva egli stesso proprio in alcune di queste missive, dove si lamentava della fatica improba che gli costava lo scrivere i suoi libri: era un prosatore lento, raramente soddisfatto di sé, faceva e rifaceva per mesi e mesi; le lettere, che avevano fini pratici ed erano buttate giù in fretta, ne risentono in pieno: sono piatte, sciatte, spesso di contenuto irrilevante o d’interesse soltanto allo studioso e al biografo. Esistono, certo, le occasionali eccezioni, soprattutto con descrizioni di luoghi esotici visitati e con accenni a persone incontrate: però è come vedere una pellicola comica che non fa ridere neanche per caso, dove ogni mezz’ora esca Totò a farci sbellicare dalle risate, ma per un minuto e basta. M’è spiaciuto davvero restare così deluso da questa pubblicazione, scrivendone con tanto rigore; ma – ripeto – di Chatwin sono sempre stato un estimatore, le mie aspettative erano alte, e la delusione in casi consimili forse rischia di rendere poco equanimi, e certamente finisce per rendere severi nel giudizio.

[Jonfaith · Rating 3 out of 5]

My best friend and I have often rejoined, that marriage can be hard. That acknowledgement pales to what had to have been required to be married to Bruce Chatwin. I feel leery of assessment. I commend Nicholas Shakespeare for the editing and Chatwin's widow for the introduction and insights. That said, I can't shake this idea that Chatwin was a selfish ass. I also shudder thinking about my own character *. Perhaps Philip Roth was correct and that life is essentially misunderstanding other people? I was most fascinated by Chatwin's thoughts on what he was reading. Apparently he preferred the transgressive -- but as long as it was slim. That fact is fascinating in itself.

As I noted while reading this, Chatwin's erudition and vision reminded me of Arthur Koestler and his honesty towards associates bore the stain of Naipaul. That said, he must have been interesting company to keep Robin Lane Fox and Susan Sontag as friends for extended periods of time. Salman Rushdie is also exposed as an opportunistic ass but that was hardly revelatory. I likely regard the reading experience as 2.5 stars but do wish it would have been leaner itself.

*My previous history with Chatwin is directly connected to a relationship, one which ended hundreds of years ago. I somehow fathomed at the time that by reading him I was maintaining that connection. My interest now tethered exclusively to Patrick Leigh Fermor, who must have been charmed by the brighter angels of Chatwin's nature.

[Andrew]

Letters from one of the great British eccentrics, very few of them having to do with his actual books, because at the end of the day it seemed more like he cared more about experiencing the diversity of human life around the world and soaking that up, all in the service of his self-declared “nomadic alternative.” Even when he developed the fungal infection that is now considered a telltale sign of AIDS, he posited it as an exotic illness of the sort caught by Tibetan silk traders or some such thing, another nomadic credential (while at the same time doing his best to ignore the circumstances of how he got that infection). As in Chatwin's novels and travelogues, the unsaid speaks loudly. I wouldn't call this essential reading, nor does it provide much insight into who Chatwin was, but it could have been far worse, and it serves as a document of a life on the road.

[Jim · Rating 5 out of 5]

In our age of digital communications, a collection of letters written to individuals is a relative rarity. Even this edition contains numerous postcard communications. Fortunately, Bruce Chatwin was an interesting person due to his incredible restlessness (I think fully half of his letters are about finding the perfect place to live, read and write) and his duplicity (he was married yet carried on a number of homosexual liaisons).

Under the Sun: The Letters of Bruce Chatwin may well be one of the last good collections of literary letters to be written in the last quarter of a century.

[Carl Rollyson · Rating 3 out of 5]

The best introduction to Chatwin's beguiling travel writing is still Nicholas Shakespeare's eponymous biography. As Shakespeare acknowledges in his introduction, collections of letters tend to be zigzags, messy and repetitive, no matter how brilliant the writer. Although Shakespeare does his best in introducing Chatwin, the newcomer to Chatwin's prose is likely to come away from this volume with the impression of a rather smug and snobbish chap--a literary traveler trying to shine for literary buddies like Susan Sontag. Fortunately, the range of Chatwin's correspondents--his parents, close friends in art and archeology, not to mention the film director James Ivory and Salman Rushdie--makes for the kind of informal, chatty feel of a deeply engrossing life that most biographers are hard put to reproduce. In her preface Elizabeth Chatwin questions the truth of her husband's travel writings, whereas Shakespeare touts their honesty. Chatwin's reputation has taken a dive in recent years, so this collection is, in part, a reclamation project--one that would have been better served, perhaps, had the editors selected fewer letters and concentrated on those that show the writer focusing on his travels and not so much on impressing others.

[icaro · Rating 1 out of 5]

Di una pesantezza estrema, soprattutto se paragonato alla prosa leggera dei libri di Chatwin. Indisponente la prefazione della moglie (odiosa), interminabilmente e inutilmente prolissa quella dell'amico (?). Solo a sprazzi (pochissimi) si ritrova lo scrittore amato. Salvo eccezioni, nelle lettere i grandi scrittori sono banali, ripetitivi e noiosi come noi comuni mortali. Inoltre la corrispondenza spesso ha il dubbio merito di mettere in luce i difetti dell'uomo...
Solo per studiosi di Chatwin o per fan ciechi (e un po' masochisti)

ps. naturalmente una stella non è per Chatwin, ma per i promotori dell'operazione, parenti ed editori inclusi...

[Bloodorange · Rating 4 out of 5]

3,5 stars, rounded up. I consider teaching Songlines, and, unwilling to spend money on Nicholas Shakespeare's biography of Chatwin, picked up this collection instead. It turned out to be a good resource, tracing the development of Chatwin's ideas, especially On the Black Hill and Songlines (the latter was, as it turns out, an incarnation of Chatwin's earlier unpublished project on nomadism).

Since my first exposure to Chatwin, I have failed to see the romance in nomadic lifestyle - one I found easy to champion by a bisexual, childless male. Yet Chatwin's letters told me he also frequently professed hatred for England, didn't want to come out as a bisexual to his parents and brother, and seemed to suffer genuine discomfort whenever he stayed anywhere longer than a month - a condition that could have been traced back to his wartime childhood.

On the whole, I was surprised by how the letters, with their natural dramaturgy, affected me: Chatwin's descriptions of the art world, which, in the seventies, looked positively like Wild West to me; his puzzling approach to art objects, especially towards the end of his life, when his health declined, due to a rare fungal infection AIDS, and his behaviour grew increasingly erratic; his unorthodox, long-distance marriage to his wife, Elizabeth (they would meet for brief spells of time in remote corners of the world - and he would try to postpone these meetings most of the time).

I wasn't bothered by the things which irritated other readers: the selection could have been more careful, I admit, as Chatwin, responding to his letters in batches, frequently used the same phrases to refer to the same situations, but I think this was natural. Shakespeare's commentary provided the much-needed background. I know people some readers referred to Elizabeth's comments as resentful - but she would have to be an oblivious saint in order to feel none.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first read Bruce Chatwin's The Songlines in 1990 after picking it up in the Seattle Public Library shortly after moving to Seattle. I don't remember now how I heard of Chatwin or why I picked it up, although my memory of it thinks that I just happened upon it on the shelf and was drawn to it, but how knows. I did however love it instantly for it's spare but evocative description of the Australian outback and it's portrayal of movement, walking or travel as a basic human need. Since then I've read his other major travel book -- In Patagonia (he was not a prolific author) and his two biographies by Susannah Clapp and Nicholas Shakespeare. Chatwin's life fascinates me because he was a curious traveler who went wherever he wanted on any lark. He was curious, a lay academic, a lover of life and of people and a collector of things, people and experiences. He lived the life I would loved to have lived. (never too late I guess).

This collection of his letters from 194 to 1989 when he died of HIV related illness showed me a couple of things. 1. He was a very funny man, which doesn't come across as much in his writing and 2. He is very witty and smart in small doses like letters and postcards. Having read so much of his life I feel sort of like a literary stalker. But having read his letters I now feel like I actually know him.

[Bookmarks Magazine · Rating 3 out of 5]

“The value in a collection of letters must lie in bringing us closer to the writer,” argued the Boston Globe, and therein lay the critics’ chief complaint: though Chatwin infuses these chatty epistles with his charm and sharp wit, he remains elusive. Without the editors’ copious annotations, in fact, readers would be completely adrift in a sea of requests for clean shirts and money. Elizabeth’s thinly veiled hostility and the book’s unnecessary length also drew some critics’ ire. However, the New York Times and Wall Street Journal did detect a progression along professional and personal lines—enough to enhance their understanding of him. Nevertheless, Under the Sun will probably only appeal to fans and those with an academic interest in Chatwin. This is an excerpt from a review published in Bookmarks magazine.

[Tittirossa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Essendo stato “pensato” da quei due superpettegoli astiosi di sua moglie Elizabeth e del suo biografo (puah) Shakespeare, non poteva essere altro che un cumulo di pettegolezzi.
Le lettere sono largamente inutili, ma è pur sempre Bruce che scrive, e quindi affascinante anche quando scrive la lista della lavanderia.
E’ uno slalom continuo tra le note e le integrazioni, del tutto inutili se non si sa “quanto” e “cosa” sia stato omesso.
Il duo è irresistibilmente odioso, soprattutto procedendo nella lettura, quando diventa evidente la selezione effettuata, dove l’unico fil rouge è la giustificazione del proprio ruolo di moglie meschina e avara che non perde occasione per ribadire che lo ha mantenuto, che si è sacrificata – il suo povero gregge abbandonato mentre lei doveva soccorrerlo! , che i suoi amici mal lo sopportavano.
Ps: per dire, dell’infinita piccineria, Shakespeare si cita in una lettera! OMG!
Le cinque ***** sono a Bruce, non alla qualità di questa raccolta

[Jonathan Gill · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really interesting insight into the life of one of my favourite authors. From his letters home to Mum and Dad from prep school, his early career and metrioric rise at Sotherbys, working for the Sunday Times and on to his writing career which sees him travel the world researching and never being in the same place for more than 5 minutes. Read The Songlines or In Patagonia if you interested in his travel writing, On the Black Hill if you prefer fiction.

[Diego Palma · Rating 5 out of 5]

No quería que terminara este libro, básicamente porque sabía que en la última hoja iba a aparecer la última palabra escrita por Chatwin. Los cuatro años antes de su muerte, son de una intensidad difícil de encontrar. Ya sabiendo su contagio del virus del VIH, Bruce finaliza cuatro textos, dos novelas, más un ensayo y una recopilación. Aún enfermo no dejaba de viajar o de decirle a sus amigos que se verían pronto. El periodo de su juventud en la Patagonia argentina y chilena es quizás uno de los más poderosos, porque su voz cambia, deja de ser un muchacho aventurero con importantes ventajas económicas, a pasar a desdibujarse con los nativos y el territorio: viajes en camiones, hospedajes en estancias, transbordadores, extensas caminatas de días e incluso semanas, conversaciones con colonos, anarquistas, curas, tehuelches y sobre todo con una mujer que construye el jardín más austral del mundo.
Lo otro maravilloso es la cantidad de personas con las que mantiene correspondencia: Susan Sontag, Roberto Calasso, Tom Maschler, Deborah Rogers, en fin... y sobre todo con Elizabeth lo acompañó hasta el final.
La verdad no quería que terminara, porque durante meses tuve un amigo a la distancia.

[Klaus Metzger · Rating 5 out of 5]

2007 besuchte ich das Rohetgarh Fort bei Jodhpur in Indien. Dort erfuhr ich von dem Besitzer, dass Bruce Chatwin im Jahre 1986 über 4 Monate dort gelebt hat, um an seinem Buch "Traumpfade/Songlines" zu arbeiten. 2013 schenkte mir meine Frau, Jutta Hartmann-Metzger, einen Taschenkalender. Denselben Kalender hatte Bruce Chatwin auf seinen Reisen dabei und nannte ihn MOLESKINE. Deshalb las ich voller Begeisterung seine aufschlussreichen Briefe, die er von zu Hause und unterwegs an seine Freunde auf der ganzen Welt geschrieben hat. Die Orte bzw. Länder im Anhang bestätigten mir, wieviele Plätze auf der Welt ich vor oder nach Bruce Chatwin besucht habe (Argentinien, Peru, Chile, Südafrika, Franreich, USA, Griechenland, China, Indien asf.). Dies ist beste Biographie über Bruce Chatwin.

Ich habe die Briefesammlung noch einmal gelesen (2022) und zahlreiche Verbindungen zu Werner Herzog, den ich als Weltenbummler und erfolgreichen Regisseur sehr schätze.

[Massimo Monteverdi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Aveva un'ossessione per il nomadismo, ne ricavò almeno due libri, ma soprattutto ne incarnò lo spirito fino al suo ultimo giorno. Questa sterminata raccolta di lettere, cartoline e telegrammi, per quanto talvolta sia inconsistente, talaltra solo irrilevante, testimonia l'inesauribile virus del viaggiatore che contagiò presto Chatwin e da cui mai guarì. Appassionerà (moderatamente) solo i fanatici.

[Kelli]

The Story:
You can argue about the truthfulness of Chatwin's travel narratives (are 'The Songlines' and 'In Patagonia' on your reading list yet?) but you can't argue about his intensely nomadic spirit. Obsessed with the idea of man as a wanderer, Chatwin spent his whole life chasing ideas and artifacts to remote locations. After giving up a promising career at Sotheby's Auction House, he moved from job to location; though gay, he remained married to his wife; an impassioned novelist, he died of Aids before finishing off a number of what-might-have-been-the-world's-best in literature. This is life, in his own words.

The Destinations:
If ever there were a case of clinical restlessness, Chatwin suffered from it. Unable to remain content in any location for more than a few weeks, he moved constantly: circling the UK from London to Oxford to Edinburgh and the Welsh border; then on to the distant horizons of New York, Patmos, Niger, Cameroon, Spain, India, Nepal, Italy, France, Australia, the West Indies, Botswana, South Africa, Argentina - eventually claiming a brief 'home' in every continent.

The Review:
It can be a dangerous thing, reading into the personal lives of our literary icons. And 'Under the Sun's format - which links in comments and memories from Chatwin's wife and friends, as well as interjectory explanations from the editor, Shakespeare - offers multiple sides to every story Chatwin tells.

Turns out he's a bit of a needy, selfish child. The man who I've adored for over decade (read 'The Songlines' RIGHT NOW!) had an admirable adventurous spirit, but a pitiable ability to handle real life. For all that, I'm still glad I got to know him better.

[Melanie H · Rating 3 out of 5]

A solid 3.5 stars and only for those who love reading other people's letters.

This isn’t the first and it certainly won’t be the last time I opine the virtues of letter writing. What is going to happen to the public intellectual when there are no more letters? How will we know the public and private thoughts of writers and travelers? Is anyone saving my emails? Is anyone even reading my emails? All the time people used to dedicate to correspondence has been lost to endless scrolling of the inter webs, interspersed with Facebook posts and Tweets written to no one in particular.

Throw a travel bug into the mix and you have some letters I can really get into. I also miss the art of conversation and meeting people in new and exciting places. Celebs, royalty, the local gentry, etc.

Probably one of the most delightful parts of this collection of letters are the footnotes supplied by Bruce Chatwin’s wife, Elizabeth. Nothing like a little after he’s dead snark to brighten my day.

Of course what doesn’t work about this collection is the elephant in the room. Bruce Chatwin was one of the first public figures in the UK to die of AIDS. I have so many questions about the secrets he kept and what Elizabeth did and did not know about Bruce’s love life.

Bruce seems of a completely different era and although we were alive at the same time for more than a decade, he's of a dying breed of travel writer seeking to find his way in the world. Not doing it for the gram, but doing it for the torture of pouring his soul into books. Maybe the world hasn't changed that much after all.

[Stephen Tuck · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've never read any of Chatwin's actual books, but I was intrigued by a review of this volume of his letters in the Spectator (http://www.spectator.co.uk/books/6227...) a few years back, so when I noticed this volume in a bargain books store I picked it up.

My strong feeling is that collections of letters are best opened at random and read from whatever looks interesting. This book certainly repays that approach. For one thing, you get some idea of what the writer was like at various stages in his career (helpfully, these letters arranged chronologically, with the collection broken up mostly into the periods in which books were being written. As a result, I now have a bit of a yen to read "On the Black Hill".

Interestingly, the writer who emerges from the letters is not a wholly appealing one. That is, Chatwin seems to have been a person who would be an interesting dinner guest, and a good correspondent. On the other hand, after a prolonged exposure one suspects he would have been fairly self-centered, a spendthrift, hopelessly committed to sponging off his friends AND OH LORD WOULD HE HAVE BEEN A KNOW-ALL. The tragedy seems to have been that the first time he ceased to be dazzled by the glare of his own brilliance was with his own approaching death from AIDS in the late 1980s. One imagines that, had he survived longer, a more rounded, more appealing person would have been found.

[Tuck · Rating 3 out of 5]

a collection of chatwin's letters, and some to him. interesting for the completeist and fascinating look at a brilliant writer, a beastly human, a peripatetic soul.
Excerpt of letter to tom maschler, head of jonathan cape, chatwin is pitching his book idea about ‘the history of nomads”….chatwin never really did write this particular book, but considered a genius of “travel writing” of latter 20th century. Chatwin seems a funny guy, treating his wife and family atrociously, friends too, but also intense, voracious, and he wrote a lot of letters.

In This particular letter, who knows how long it was, he basically narrated an in-depth outline of a future book (that he never really wrote) to a prospective publisher, and here chatwin winds down the outline/idea….
From page 139 “Now for today.. We may have enough food even, but we certainly do not have enough room. Marshall McLuhan asks us to accept that literacy, the lynch-pin if civilization is OUT; that electric technology is by-passing the ‘rational processes of learning’ and that jobs and specialists are things of the past. “the world has become a Global Village’, he says. Or is it mobile encampments? ‘The expert is the man who stays put.’ Literature, he says, will disappear and social barriers are coming down; everyone is free for the higher exercises of the mind (or spirit?). One thing is certain---the Paterfamilias, that bastion of civilization (not the matriarch) is right OUT.”

[Joy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had no idea who Bruce Chatwin was -- a writer and nomad who was "forever on a quest of the exotic and the unexpected." Chatwin died at 48 only a few years ago of AIDS. He had a long marriage but was bi-sexual. He started his career in England, he was British, working at Sothby's, becoming an art expert.
As he travelled with his work, he developed a love of travel and really moved easily in diverse art,
literary, and social circles. His wife was from a wealthy New England family, so his travels also included the U.S. He always travelled alone: "Two people have a defense, but a single person is approachable." Chatwin on San Francisco: "So we went to San Francisco which is so unlike anything else in the U.S. it doesn't really bear thinking about. It's utterly light-weight and sugary with no sense of purpose or depth. The people are overcome with an incurable frivolity whenever they set foot in it." Kasmin on Chatwin: "Bruce's biggest problem was where to be. He never knew where to be. It was always somewhere else." Chatwin on Indira Gandhi: "I was prepared to allow her at least a dimension of greatness, but all you find is a lying scheming bitch."

[Jeff Burdick · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection of letters is fascinating for those who have read Chatwin's books. Many of them are simply postcards; a few are extended discussions on topics about travel and the meaning of things. What is interesting to me is how charmed Chatwin's life seemed: he had a wife who clearly loved him despite his many affairs and long absences; he made connections with interesting people no matter where he went; and opportunity seemed to leap at him. He was always broke (often because he bought art that he couldn't afford) yet there was always someone there to offer him an article to write or to send him to somewhere interesting. He seems to have moved about 87 times, always looking for someplace to land, always looking to flee where he was. The letters are repetitive and often banal. His writing is always interesting.

[Lazarus P Badpenny Esq · Rating 4 out of 5]

Letters and diaries are often like slipping into a warm bath. To be in the company of his words once more was a great pleasure.

As a letter writer Chatwin tended towards gossip rather than the deliberately insightful. One picks up the impression that he preferred conversation as a way to share and develop his ideas amongst his intimates.

What they do imply is a personal selfishness of some boundless magnitude. Even as a fan of his writing one cannot help but side with his long-suffering wife, Elizabeth.

[Adrian]

This volume covers the correspondence of the enigmatic British writer from schooldays in the '40s, through his years at Sothebys, past years of busy travelling when he produced terrific books right up to the sad, horrible end by AIDS in early 1989. Not easy to love, wife Elizabeth pays Bruce a great tribute here. For whatever reason Chatwin left an imprint on many people he met sometimes only briefly. I've read three of his books, a biography and now his letters so he made a mark here as well. Fascinating guy.

[Anne Braudy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found Bruce Chatwin and his letters after reading Priscilla by Nicolas Shakespeare (wonderful book) and seeing Shakespeare wrote a biography of Chatwin, found my way more interestedly to the collected letters of Chatwin than the biography.

I read this book of letters over months of stationery cycling indoor - coffee, letters of Chatwin, and cycling - a lovely combination. Chatwin a very interesting fellow and now I might even check out out one of his book.

[Philippe Malzieu · Rating 5 out of 5]

Chatwin died of the AIDS at 48 years in Nice. It is an immense writer traveller like Stevenson, Cleizio David-neel. His death tetanized many of its faithful readers. One thought it immortal with his teenager's face . One expected the next work to have his news. And one days no more book.
Difficult

[RBick · Rating 5 out of 5]

one of my absolute faves. So crammed full with the most specific richly coloured detail. Cleverly edited to paint sensitive and subtle relational narrative. One to keep coming back to and back to for travel (and all sorts of) inspiration. A wonderful collection of letters from a truly individual talent.

[Emma · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beautiful as the letters are, I find Chatwin the person to be less likable with each letter I read. Pompous, manipulative, cold with a personality that seems far too artificial to be able to identify with. Still the language is melodious and passionate, a worthy read.

[Teague · Rating 2 out of 5]

the editor needed a heavier hand.

[MARTA · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very interesting to find out what was going on inside the writer's mind

[Lazarus-II · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5/5 or 7/10

[Jennifer Elliott · Rating 5 out of 5]

It seems wrong to write that I have finished this book as I read it to the point where Bruce Chatwin died but I'm sure I will dip into the rest of the archival material and references over some time, however the story has come to an end of sorts.
Bruce Chatwin has fascinated me since I read The Songlines in about 1988, and this book has his edited letters listed, curated by Nicholas Shakespeare, with whom he communicated during his lifetime, and his wife Elizabeth, so we can see how his life and writing intersected and developed through his own words. The Songlines sits on my bedside table and I sometimes pick it up and read it, as though talking to a friend, to remind myself of the story.
Bruce Chatwin died young, at 49, and was a wanderer and seeker all his life, with amazing curiosity and intellectual wanderlust. He was fascinated by the concept.of Nomads in human culture, initially through his work at Sotheby's auctions, then study in archaeology and then in professional writing and travelling.
His letters tell his story, and introduce the important people in his life, and I found it an interesting way to learn about someone, how they speak and behave, through their own words. At the end of his life his medical diagnosis of AIDS gave him great difficulty in honestly sharing the truth of his situation, but I can understand the social stigma that he confronted, and why he re shaped his 'fungus' to his own needs in letters.
I can't do a suitable precis, too much happens in his life to do it justice in my words except to say that I believe him to be a remarkable man who gave me a realisation of the Songlines before it became something that we talked about in Australia, and I think him for that.
He wrote other books, Utz, In Patagonia, On the Black Hill, The Viceroy of Ouidah which are also very interesting, but Songlines is, for me, a unique strange and wonderful book full of Australian characters, written by a man who was himself the most unique of all.
I do suggest anyone wanting to use the resources after the letters to buy a hard copy, as I found referring to the items on an E-Book tricky and tedious.