{"id":224,"date":"2020-05-02T13:00:29","date_gmt":"2020-05-02T17:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/patagonia\/?page_id=224"},"modified":"2020-05-09T21:28:23","modified_gmt":"2020-05-10T01:28:23","slug":"chatwins-patagonia","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/patagonia\/chatwins-patagonia\/","title":{"rendered":"Chatwin’s Patagonia"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Photo of Chatwin by Lord Snowdon<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

“In Patagonia<\/em> was in a category of its own. It was clearly not a novel, but it flirted with fiction. A collage of histories, sketches, myths and memories, with short scenes glinting towards each other, without judgment, conclusion or, often, links. Chatwin said he was trying to make a cubist portrait. It is paradoxical, in content and in style. The syntax is snappy but the vocabulary is orchidaceous. It holds back from intimate revelation”<\/p>\n

\u2014 Susannah Clap from The Guardian<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Chatwin was a British journalist who traveled through Patagonia, staying in the residents’ homes and learning their stories while tracing an artifact of a prehistoric creature from a relative.\u00a0 In Patagonia<\/em> depicts snapshots of their lives and their history through tales of murder, isolation, and self-sufficiency. The vignettes of their lives as well as the lasting mystery of thieves create an imagery of a new “Wild West,” and through the Wild West imagery, the notion that Patagonia is the last remaining wilderness of the world.<\/p>\n

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A first edition of In Patagonia. From Raptis Rare Books.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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“Bruce Chatwin\u2019s In Patagonia was a bible among South American backpackers. People quoted it as if recalling their own impressions, and took its stories as historical fact despite the book\u2019s lyricism. The author\u2019s poor Spanish was overlooked, as was the book\u2019s political backdrop: the dark days of state-sponsored terrorism following the death of Juan Per\u00f3n. Blonde boy-wonder Bruce was the only guide worth having…<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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In divulging Patagonia\u2019s myths it placed the region on everyone\u2019s imaginative map. But the author was also adept at self-mythologising and chose to give little account of his actual travels \u2013 the roads he used and the transport that got him around during his four-month sojourn. Chatwin simply appears in places, rather like a genie. This gives the book its brisk pace but confounds any sense of time or space, a curious effect given the vastness of Patagonia.”<\/p>\n

\u2014 Chris Moss from The Telegraph<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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Further Readings<\/h4>\n

Clapp, Susannah. “‘Dazzling and Worrying’: My Memories of Bruce Chatwin and In Patagonia<\/em>.” The\u00a0<\/em>Guardian<\/i>, September 24, 2017. https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/books\/2017\/sep\/24\/bruce-chatwin-in-patagonia-fortieth-anniversary.<\/p>\n

Moss, Chris. “Patagonia: In the Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin.”\u00a0The Telegraph<\/em>, December 1, 2014. https:\/\/www.telegraph.co.uk\/travel\/destinations\/south-america\/articles\/Patagonia-In-the-footsteps-of-Bruce-Chatwin\/<\/p>\n

Moss, Chris. “Patagonia.” Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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