The Elephanta suite
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Language
English
Description
A master of the travel narrative weaves three intertwined novellas of Westerners transformed by their sojourns in India. This startling, far-reaching book captures the tumult, ambition, hardship, and serenity that mark today’s India. Theroux’s Westerners risk venturing far beyond the subcontinent’s well-worn paths to discover woe or truth or peace. A middle-aged couple on vacation veers heedlessly from idyll to chaos. A buttoned-up Boston lawyer finds succor in Mumbai’s reeking slums. And a young woman befriends an elephant in Bangalore. We also meet Indian characters as singular as they are reflective of the country’s subtle ironies: an executive who yearns to become a holy beggar, an earnest young striver whose personality is rewired by acquiring an American accent, a miracle-working guru, and others. As ever, Theroux’s portraits of people and places explode stereotypes to exhilarating effect. The Elephanta Suite urges us toward a fresh, compelling, and often inspiring notion of what India is, and what it can do to those who try to lose—or find—themselves there.
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Contributors
Theroux, Paul Author
ISBN
9780618943326
9780547347295
9780547347295
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Bill Bryson's provocative travel accounts, which also include personal reflection and commentary, adventure, eccentric characters, and humor, will appeal to fans of Theroux's travel writing. Bryson emphasizes his own experience, and also explores other subjects alongside the travel. -- Katherine Johnson
These authors offer witty, candid, and insightful accounts of personal experiences in exotic locations with diverse inhabitants. Their graceful prose, perceptive observations, and vivid descriptions of poorer and less-traveled regions offer readers fascinatingly rich perspectives on our world. -- Derek Keyser
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