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I live in Patagonia
“I moved to Patagonia, on the Chilean side and have traversed the Andes north and south of here. I read many travel and guide books before hand, and none quite prepared me for Patagonia. I have just now finished his book, and I can tell you...Patagonia has not changed much. The earlier writer who debunked him must have been just a passer through, because life is still very much like "In Patagonia". I'm living and learning it ... still. March 2009.
An amazon user wrote this on 2009-03-16.
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2 of 2 members found this review helpful.
Slow as a sloth
“When a book lacks tension and features extensive quoting, it's bound to be boring. This book is boring, and the main reason is that it lacks a narrative thread, other than "been there, saw somebody, told me a long and winding story about somebody who was here some day". All trips are inner trips, but in this case I would say Chatwin looked inside himself, found not a lot, and decided instead to cut and paste from old stories from down south. ”
An amazon user wrote this on 2008-05-02. -
2 of 2 members found this review helpful.
A Romatic tale of Patagonia
“ Chatwin's account of his journey across Patagonia in the late 1970's certainly is embellished with all the qualities of a good English romantic. His tale begins with a memory from his childhood about a piece skin that was in the procession of his grandmother. She told him that is belonged to a Brontosaurus and came from the distant land of Patagonia in the south of Argentina. It turns out that the piece of skin in question actually belonged to a Mylodon, an ancient Giant Sloth native to Patagonia, and Chatwin received his fair share of belittlement from his schoolmasters for claiming it came from a dinosaur. Still, he held a special revere for the skin though and hoped to become its caretaker one day. Unfortunately the skin was tossed out after his grandmother passed away. He never lost his fascination with the distant and mysterious land of Patagonia though and always hoped to secure a piece of Mylodon skin for himself one day.
An amazon user wrote this on 2007-06-11.
Fast-forward about 25 years and we pick up Chatwin's story as he arrives in Argentina, finally fulfilling his dream to visit Patagonia. His journey takes him all over modern Patagonia, if one can use the word modern in regards to the region, bouncing from town to town in search of old legends and odd tales. He investigates the haunts of the last known days of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, visits the beaches the Darwin visited during his famous voyage aboard the Beagle, even visits the famous Mylodon cave where the archaic animal's remains were discovered.
Chatwin tells a remarkable tale and brings a nice mingling of history, myth, travel and local flavor all into one narrative. At several points he takes time to digress on several side stories that have a connection to the place he is visiting or a story that he is in the progress of rooting out. In spite of all this, or perhaps because of it, one gets the felling that all that Chatwin writes is not the stone cold truth. Certainly some areas are embellished to facilitate the flow of the narrative. Due to this it is hard to separate fact from fiction, but in a work such as this it is not especially important. Chatwin conveys the magic and mystery of the land that has for so long held a special place in his mind. He gives us a glimpse of what Patagonia has meant and stood for for generation after generation of seekers and travelers.” -
1 of 1 members found this review helpful.
Brilliant work
“It's rare to encounter such subtle humor as one finds here; the book is not only an adept sketch of life at the bottom of the world, it's a screamingly, if subtly, funny throughout. I borrowed it from the library, read it, and was so entertained and impressed that I sought out and purchased a copy. Simply a terrific book.”
An amazon user wrote this on 2007-01-10. -
3 of 3 members found this review helpful.
More interesting than informative.
“Depending on what you look for in a "travel" book you may or may not like this. If you're looking for history, natural history, or political developments, this is not the book for you. It is not comprehensive in any way.
An amazon user wrote this on 2005-01-29.
If you're looking for entertaining reading set in an interesting location with snippets of odd information this book would be entertaining. Of travel authors I have read, this author most closely resembles Theroux, but without the curmudgeonly judging. Like Theroux, his facts may or may not be correct but he doesn't claim to be writing a textbook, just some stuff that happened to him in this place.
Mercifully, Chatwin spares us deep philosphical introspections so prevalent in much modern "travel" writing.
I read it and enjoyed it and recommend it.”
