The Way of the World

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A cult classic, Nicholas Bouvier’s The Way of the World is one of the most beguiling travel books ever written . . .

Reborn from the ashes of a Pakistani rubbish heap, it tells of a friendship between a writer and an artist, forged on an impecunious, life-enhancing journey from Serbia to Afghanistan in the 1950s. On one level it is a candid description of a road journey, on another a meditation on travel as a journey towards the self, all written by Bouvier, a sage with a golden pen and a wide, infectious smile. It is published here for the first time in English with the Vernet drawings which are such a dynamic part of its whole.

‘Bouvier is that rare author who alerts the reader to the transcendent dimension of travel, by which the genuine traveller is transformed.’ Jason Elliot

Bouvier, Nicolas

Ad Hoc through Afghanistan

Dervla Murphy on Nicolas Bouvier, The Way of the World

Which century are we in? Which country? Nicolas Bouvier’s vignette in The Way of the World won’t puzzle those of us (a rapidly dwindling cohort) who can remember Afghanistan during the reign of...

Stranger in Paradise

John Keay on Nicolas Bouvier, The Scorpion-Fish

The beauty of short books is that you can afford to read them more than once. In the case of Nicolas Bouvier’s The Scorpion-Fish I read it through and then double-read it. In other words, on the...