A beautiful paperback edition of a landmark of 20th Century literature, by acclaimed author Paul Bowles
In this classic work of psychological terror, Paul Bowles examines the ways in which Americans apprehend an alien culture–and the ways in which their incomprehension destroys them. The story of three American travelers adrift in the cities and deserts of North Africa after World War II, The … Africa after World War II, The Sheltering Sky is at once merciless and heartbreaking in its compassion. It etches the limits of human reason and intelligence–perhaps even the limits of human life –when they touch the unfathomable emptiness and impassive cruelty of the dessert.
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The Sheltering Sky
I read this book a while ago and I liked it a lot.
Now to the better story…
http://themoth.org/posts/stories/courting-paul-bowles-in-tangier
This story is about a group of people who idolized Paul Bowles and spent all this time and energy tracking him down in Morroco. And they finally did and they got to meet him!
but they realized they had nothing to say to him.
“o nice you are paul bowles”
“ya that’s me, ole paul”
“cool”
“thanks yeah”
“…”
As I write this there has just been a power grid failure in the state of Texas in the middle of a very harsh winter. Because of this failure the sudden lack of heat has caused several people in one of the most modern countries on earth to freeze to death.
One person it is reported froze to death while sitting in a recliner in his living room. Perhaps being so used to our convenient modern life he forgot like many that our industrial civilization is actually not the real world but a thin vulnerable system and bubble that protects us from the really real world, a chaotic universe of elements and forces that is always waiting willing and able to wipe us out
Which brings me to The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles
Like Heart of Darkness this stunning novel is a terrifying tour through the darkness and vulnerability to folly that lies like a bear trap within our human nature.
Set in the 1940s it is the story of a wealthy American couple who bored with the city and modern western civilization unwisely decide to take a vacation into the uncertain and dangerous desert wilds of exotic third world North Africa.
Watching the naïve childish pair go suicidally deeper and deeper into existential danger is like watching one of those old silent movies where a baby crawls into a busy construction site.
Only without the happy ending.
Like Heart of Darkness its serious and terrifying revelations are an attempt at a warning.
Though our western civilization may be boring at times, it seems to say, the lure of the exotic that calls from the shadows in the dark is more often than not merely the sweet perfume of a Venus fly trap.
As Paul McCandlis found in real life in the book Into The Wild (as well as that Grizzly bear loving guy from California who was devoured by one of his furry new friends) though nature may be beautiful, though it may even be sublime, it is not your friend.
On the contrary.
If you wander far enough away from the warm campfire of civilized humanity backed up by a free and just rule of law you often do so at your incredible peril.
This story points out rightly that the story of humanity and civilization lies in our ongoing vigilant conquest of exterior nature.
Not blindly throwing ourselves into its arms because we are bored.
For in actuality the embrace of nature is far less grandmotherly hug or grand fun adventure as foolish bored civilization drunk people sometimes wish to imagine.
And much more like a horror movie snapping shut of a great white shark’s razor sharp jaws through one’s torso.
After reading this book I’ve added Morocco and the Sahara to my travel itinerary next year. What a story! Bowles own experience with typhoid fever gives him a strong edge in telling this gripping tale. Reminiscent of Graham Greene in the way the exotic is highlighted.
I wanted to like this book, but I found it disjointed and couldn’t make myself care about the characters. Strangely, I liked the movie better.
The movie is good, too.
It’s a classic, but I found it difficult to read because so much of it was stream of consciousness (or, perhaps more accurately, unconsciousness, or drugged consciousness), taking place inside the characters’ addled heads. The characters were difficiult to like. Wonderful, atmospheric descriptions of the geography ad inhabitants of the Sahara, however made it worth reading.
Not one I’d recommend, it seemed very navel gazing for the first 60% then oddly non analyzing for the strange 40% balance.
loved this book
I finished the book in one night. Still thinking about the ending.
I suppose I should get the point but I didn’t…
Very enjoyable, though
I enjoyed the movie but not the book . It is a little dated and a little dEnse