Take the A Train

IN HIS NEW TRAVEL BOOK Paul Theroux describes one town that is so dull he bought dental floss to keep busy. Well, folks, get out your dental floss.

After describing Europe and Asia in his best-selling The Great Railway Bazaar, Theroux has moved his one man railway show into the western hemisphere. This time he chose the jaunt between Boston and Southern Argentina, once again via the tracks. In what would seem like a replay with just a change in geography, this book lacks the characters, scandals, tall tales and disasters that usually make this genre successful.

Most of all it lacks enthusiasm. For two months Theroux's only travelling companion is his grumpiness. For 400 pages we have to put up with both of them. For example, when caught in the mad pre-game rush of a Guatemalan soccer match, all he thinks about is leaving. Throughout the book Theroux keeps asking whether it's worth the trouble. An unadventurous adventurer, he skips carnivals and sidesteps invitations at every turn, like the man who goes to a museum and refuses to look at the pictures.

Theroux has manufactured a masochistic journey. Instead of taking side trips in to the bush, he feels obliged to continue on the trains, treating us to flies, rats, humidity, diarrhea and other vacation treats. He is constantly near exhaustion and despair. Complaints color all his comments; he criticizes the books he reads; everyone bores him. Each new town is another burden and descriptions become indistinguishable--arriving hot and dirty at a collection of huts, he walks the streets, settles into a hotel, and disparages the food. Fun includes testing fellow passengers: "How many miles are there between stops?" Disgust overpowers sympathy.

Nevertheless, Theroux includes some passable anecdotes, like one on the inappropriate naming of South American cities: "None of the Lagunas Verdes was green...Progreso in Guatemala was backward; La Liberated in El Salvador, a stronghold of repression in a country where salvation seemed in short supply." And his descriptions of the class stigmas on the trains and his interview with Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges are superb.

So perhaps the book's overall blandness is not Theroux's fault--maybe the geography is to blame. After all, squalor in Mexico is pretty similar to squalor in Peru. South America lacks the historical associations of Europe and the exotic attractions of Asia. Maybe Theroux's topic is not interesting?

But there are two ways travel books can succeed: if the travels are boring, the traveler can still intrigue. Theroux does not, and there lies the problem with this book. In this travelogue of narrative and commentary, Theroux lacks a point of view--he is reflective to no purpose. The book is scenery without sentiment, and in the and we remember poverty, not personalities.