Bruce Chatwin's death in 1989 brought a meteoric career to an abrupt end, since he burst onto the literary scene in 1977 with his first book, In Patagonia.
Chatwin himself was different things to different people: a journalist, a photographer, an art collector, a restless traveller and a bestselling author; he was also a married man, an active homosexual, a socialite who loved to mix with the rich and famous, and a single-minded loner who explored the limits of extreme solitude.
From unrestricted access to Chatwin's private notebooks, diaries and letters, Nicholas Shakespeare has compiled the definitive biography of one of the most charismatic and elusive literary figures of our time.
'A magnificent work of empathy and detection'
Colin Thubron, Sunday Times
'Utterly compelling'
Philip Marsden, Mail on Sunday
'A fascinating account of the man behind the myth'
Ian Thomson, Guardian
Bruce Chatwin
Description
Author Description
Nicholas Shakespeare was born in 1957. The son of a diplomat, much of his youth was spent in the Far East and South America. His novels have been translated into twenty languages. They include The Vision of Elena Silves, winner of the Somerset Maugham Award, Snowleg, and The Dancer Upstairs, which was chosen by the American Libraries Association in 1997 as the year's best novel, and in 2001 was made into a film of the same name by John Malkovich. His most recent novel is Inheritance. He is married with two small boys and currently lives in Oxford.