Summary
The award-winning novelist takes us on some of his most memorable journeys in this revelatory collection of travel essays. Now in his mid-seventies, Russell Banks has indulged his wanderlust for more than half a century. In this compelling anthology, he writes that since childhood he has "longed for... Full description
Summary: |
The award-winning novelist takes us on some of his most memorable journeys in this revelatory collection of travel essays. Now in his mid-seventies, Russell Banks has indulged his wanderlust for more than half a century. In this compelling anthology, he writes that since childhood he has "longed for escape, for rejuvenation, for wealth untold, for erotic and narcotic and sybaritic fresh starts, for high romance, mystery and intrigue." The longing for escape has taken him from the "bright green islands and turquoise seas" of the Caribbean to peaks in the Himalayas, the Andes, and beyond. Banks shares highlights from his travels: interviewing Fidel Castro in Cuba; motoring to a hippie reunion with college friends in Chapel Hill, North Carolina; eloping to Edinburgh to marry his fourth wife, Chase; driving a sunset-orange metallic Hummer down Alaska's Seward Highway. In each of these remarkable essays, Banks considers his life and the world. In Everglades National Park, he traces his own timeline: "I keep going back, and with increasing clarity I see more of the place and more of my past selves. And more of the past of the planet as well." Recalling his trips to the Caribbean in the title essay, Banks dissects his relationships with the four women who would become his wives. In the Himalayas, he embarks on a different quest: "One climbs a mountain, not to conquer it, but to be lifted like this away from the earth up into the sky," he explains. Pensive, frank, beautiful, and engaging, this book brings together the social, the personal, and the historical, opening a path into the heart and soul of this revered writer.--Adapted from dust jacket. |
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Physical Description: |
272 pages ; 24 cm |
ISBN: |
006185767X 9780061857676 |
Author Notes: |
The first in his family to attend college, Banks studied at Colgate University and later graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of North Carolina, at Chapel Hill. While he was establishing himself as a writer, Banks spent time as a plumber, shoe salesman, and a window dresser. He wrote 21 books of fiction and nonfiction. Banks's titles include Searching for Survivors, Family Life, Hamilton Stark, The New World, The Book of Jamaica, Trailerpark, The Relation of My Imprisonment, Continental Drift, Success Stories, Affliction, The Sweet Hereafter and Dreaming Up America. Banks has also written numerous poems, stories, and essays. His last novel was The Magic Kingdom was published in November 2022. Banks is the recipient of several awards and prizes. Among his accolades are the St. Lawrence Award for Short Fiction, the John Dos Passos Award, and the Literature Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. In 1986, Continental Drift was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Russell Banks died on January 7, 2023, at his home in upstate New York. He was 82. (Bowker Author Biography) |