Changes

And through this constantly shifting background of his enthusiasms and 'making ends meet', emerges repeatedly his creative battle with his works. Those who know 'Utz' and 'The Songlines' will find a good deal here about their birth and development, but perhaps most intriguing is the book that he never completed, the exploration of the nomadic way of life which he felt held the key to not only understanding human history but the human soul itself. A book that perhaps was intended as much as anything to uncover his understanding of himself.

[[The Kingdom by the Sea: A Journey Around the Coast of Great Britain by Paul Theroux]] is a closer comparison, because it deals with some of the issues of the 1980s in Britain which Chatwin's letters chronicle, but also shows the kind of 'outside observer' travel writing which Chatwin moves away from, to the attempt at recreating the (albeit semi-fictional) insider view.