Nearly all of Paul Theroux’s fiction is about a person — usually male, often a writer — trying to solve a problem. In several of the stories from The Vanishing Point, his new collection, that problem doesn’t have a solution.
He describes a vanishing point as a moment when seemingly all the lines running through one’s life converge and one can see no further, yet we must deal with the implications. “It doesn’t really vanish,” he says. “It’s just that you can’t see what’s beyond it. It’s not invisible. It’s unreadable. A mystery.”
The stories in this new collection span the globe, from Hawaii and the South Seas to Africa and New England.
They have all the qualities I love in Theroux’s writing: a sharp bite of satire that skewers pretension, crisp dialogue, and an eye for the small, clear detail — an action, a pattern of speech, an element of dress — that reveals someone’s deepest character.
He describes the things we all see but don’t mention in polite conversation, and he shines a light on thoughts we actively avoid. That’s the sort of thing we’re talking about in today’s podcast.
Paul Theroux is the author of some 33 works of fiction including The Mosquito Coast and The Bad Angel Brothers, and 19 travel books including The Great Railway Bazaar and Dark Star Safari, books that cemented his standing as our greatest living travel writer.
You can read more about him on his website, and follow him on Instagram, Facebook and X.
We spoke about aging, childhood reading, and how taking risks can make you wise.
I also published a video version of this conversation. You’ll find it on my YouTube channel if you’d like to watch as well as listen.
These are the books we mentioned in the podcast:
Read Paul’s story ‘First Love’ on Electric Literature
We also mentioned:
Eye of the Storm by Patrick White
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