Paul Theroux Quotes - Page 7

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• Sightseeing was ... based on imaginative invention, like rehearsing your own play in stage sets from which all the actors had fled.

  Paul Theroux

  Play, Actors, Invention

  Paul Theroux (2011). “The Tao of Travel: Enlightenments from Lives on the Road”, p.18, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• Someone who seems doddery is perhaps not doddery at all but only an older person absorbed in squinting concentration, as though on an ultimate trip, memorizing a scene, grateful for being alive to see it.

  Paul Theroux

  Grateful, Squinting, Alive

  Paul Theroux (2013). “The Last Train to Zona Verde: My Ultimate African Safari”, p.80, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• For years I felt that being respectable meant maintaining a sinister complacency, and the disreputable freedom I sought helped make me a writer.

  Paul Theroux

  Years, Complacency, Maintaining

  Paul Theroux (1986). “Sunrise with Seamonsters”, p.3, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• Railways are irresistible bazaars, snaking along perfectly level no matter what the landscape, improving your mood with speed, and never upsetting your drink.

  Paul Theroux

  Travel, Upset, Bazaars

  Paul Theroux (2006). “The Great Railway Bazaar”, p.9, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• The wish to disappear sends many travelers away. If you are thoroughly sick of being kept waiting at home or at work, travel is perfect: let other people wait for a change. Travel is a sort of revenge for having been put on hold, or having to leave messages on answering machines, not knowing your party's extension, being kept waiting all your working life - the homebound writer's irritants. But also being kept waiting is the human conditon.

  Paul Theroux

  Revenge, Party, Home

  Paul Theroux (2004). “Dark Star Safari: Overland from Cairo to Cape Town”, p.3, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• The conversation, like many others I had with people on trains, derived an easy candour from the shared journey, the comfort of the dining car, and the certain knowledge that neither of us would see each other again.

  Paul Theroux

  Journey, People, Car

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• The monotony of staying in one place is the best thing for writing a novel. Having regular habits, a kind of security, but especially no big surprises, no shocks.

  Paul Theroux

  Writing, Kind, Surprise

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• Writers are painful friends, and they are seldom friendly with others. They are insecure in the presence of other writers. Composers of certain kinds of music are the same--tormented and intolerant. Yet some arts not only make the artist social but make him depend upon sociability in order to succeed. Painting is one.

  Paul Theroux

  Art, Insecure, Order

  Paul Theroux (2006). “The Kingdom by the Sea: A Journey Around the Coast of Great Britain”, p.57, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• Bogotá seemed a cruel towering place, like an eagles' nest now inhabited by vultures and their dying prey.

  Paul Theroux

  Eagles, Dying, Nests

  Paul Theroux (2014). “The Old Patagonian Express: By Train Through the Americas”, p.295, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• The pleasure a reader gets is often equal to the pleasure a writer is given.

  Paul Theroux

  Pleasure, Given, Equal

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• Although I'm not fluent in sign language by a long way, I could have a fairly decent conversation.

  Paul Theroux

  Long, Sign Language, Way

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• Men in their late 50s often make very bad decisions.

  Paul Theroux

  Men, Decision, Bad Decision

  "'Travel is nasty'". Interview with Emma Brockes, www.theguardian.com. June 9, 2002.

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• The realization that he is white in a black country, and respected for it, is the turning point in the expatriate's career. He can either forget it, or capitalize on it. Most choose the latter.

  Paul Theroux

  Country, Careers, White

  Paul Theroux (1986). “Sunrise with Seamonsters”, p.47, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• I think most serious and omnivorous readers are alike- intense in their dedication to the word, quiet-minded, but relieved and eagerly talkative when they meet other readers and kindred spirits.

  Paul Theroux

  Thinking, Dedication, Serious

  Paul Theroux (2008). “Ghost train to the eastern star: on the tracks of the Great Railway Bazaar”

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• Many aspects of the writing life have changed since I published my first book, in the 1960s. It is more corporate, more driven by profits and marketing, and generally less congenial - but my day is the same: get out of bed, procrastinate, sit down at my desk, try to write something.

  Paul Theroux

  Book, Writing, Marketing

  "Fiction in the Age of E-Books". "The Atlantic" Interview, www.theatlantic.com. 2010.

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• So far I had been travelling alone with my handbook and my Western Railway timetable: I was happiest finding my own way and did not require a liaison man. It had been my intention to stay on the train, without bothering about arriving anywhere: sight-seeing was a way of passing the time, but, as I had concluded in Istanbul, it was an activity very largely based on imaginative invention, like rehearsing your own play in stage sets from which all the actors had fled.

  Paul Theroux

  Men, Istanbul, Sight

  Paul Theroux (1976). “The great railway bazaar: by train through Asia”

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• An island is a fixed and finite piece of geography, and usually the whole place has been carved up and claimed.

  Paul Theroux

  Islands, Pieces, Geography

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• I think I understand passion. Love is something else.

  Paul Theroux

  Passion, Love Is, Thinking

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• A novel captures essence that is not possible in any other form.

  Paul Theroux

  Essence, Form, Capture

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• Extensive traveling induces a feeling of encapsulation, and travel, so broadening at first, contracts the mind.

  Paul Theroux

  Travel, Feelings, Mind

  Paul Theroux (2006). “The Great Railway Bazaar”, p.229, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• The people of Hong Kong are criticized for only being interested in business, but it's the only thing they've been allowed to do.

  Paul Theroux

  People, Hong Kong

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• It might be said that a great unstated reason for travel is to find places that exemplify where one has been happiest. Looking for idealised versions of home-indeed, looking for the perfect memory.

  Paul Theroux

  Memories, Home, Perfect

  Paul Theroux (2001). “Fresh Air Fiend: Travel Writings”, p.30, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• Is there any point in going across the world to eat something or buy something or watch people squatting among their ruins? Travel is a state of mind. It has nothing to do with distance or the exotic. It is almost entirely an inner experience.

  Paul Theroux

  Distance, People, Mind

  Paul Theroux (2001). “Fresh Air Fiend: Travel Writings”, p.78, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• A person who is tired of London is not necessarily tired of life; it might be that he just can’t find a parking place.

  Paul Theroux

  Tired, Might, London

  Paul Theroux (1986). “Sunrise with Seamonsters”, p.311, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• And that is all anyone can do, try to be honest about what he feels, what he's seen or thinks he's seen.

  Paul Theroux

  Thinking, Trying, Honest

  Paul Theroux (1986). “Sunrise with Seamonsters”, p.47, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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