I was always aware of Paul Theroux growing up. I was raised in a family that traveled (and travels) by train and had read Theroux’s travel books. There was also a VHS of The Mosquito Coast, with a crazed Harrison Ford staring back at you, and a tagline proclaiming that “He planned a paradise. He created a Hell.”
I think the first Theroux I read on my own was the delightful Riding the Iron Rooster, about his travels (mostly by train) through the People’s Republic of China in the mid-1980s. The thing about Theroux is that he’s interested in the world around him and in seeking out new experiences. When he travels to a new place, he talks to people and asks penetrating questions. His books weren’t banned by Singapore and apartheid South Africa for nothing.
I read Riding the Iron Rooster while on study abroad in Germany in 2003. My father probably gave it to me. I have an email listing five books I’d read in the first month: