The Best American Travel Writing 2001 [Paperback]

Already a best-selling addition to the series, this year’s Best American Travel Writing is a far-flung collection chosen by travel writer extraordinaire Paul Theroux, who has selected pieces about “the spell in the wilderness, the letter home from foreign parts, the dangerous adventure, the sentimental journey, the exposé, the shocking revelation, the eyewitness report, the ordeal, the quest . . . Travel is an attitude, a state of mind.” Theroux’s most recent novel is Hotel Honolulu.

Already a best-selling addition to the series, this year’s Best American Travel Writing is a far-flung collection chosen by travel writer extraordinaire Paul Theroux, who has selected pieces about “the spell in the wilderness, the letter home from foreign parts, the dangerous adventure, the sentimental journey, the exposé, the shocking revelation, the eyewitness report, the ordeal, the quest . . . Travel is an attitude, a state of mind.” Theroux’s most recent novel is Hotel Honolulu.

Foreword I have been sent many odd promotional items by wrongheaded public relations people desperate for me to write about their clients. Nothing, however, has been more misguided than the Kwikpoint® International Translator that I received a few years ago.
The Kwikpoint® International Translator is a laminated, legal- sized card, folded three times, with full-color illustrations inside and out. On the front cover, the Kwikpoint® International Translator proclaims: “Say It with Pictures!”; “Point to Pictures and Make Yourself Understood Anywhere in the World!” Above those proclamations is a cartoon drawing of a tourist, a man with a camera strapped around his neck, seated at a restaurant table. His ignored menu sits beside him on the table and in his hands is a trusty Kwikpoint® International Translator. The man points at a simple illustration of a cup of cofflÊ