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This reads as a comment on how any life story is assembled from fragments, not from complete certainty. It points to the idea that memory, selection, and interpretation shape biography, including our own, so truth is always partly arranged. It lands when someone is trying to explain why a person can never be fully captured on the page, or even by themselves.
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Originally said in English.
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About Paul Theroux
American novelist and travel writer
Paul Theroux is an American novelist and travel writer. He is known for books that move between fiction and travel writing, including the travelogue The Great Railway Bazaar. His work has reached beyond the page as well. The Mosquito Coast won the 1981 James Tait Black Memorial Prize, and some of his fiction has been adapted for film and television, including versions of The Mosquito Coast.
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Books by Paul Theroux
The Great Railway Bazaar
1977
The Elephanta suite
2007
Ghost Train to the Eastern Star
2007
A Dead Hand
2010
The happy isles of Oceania
1999