Earlier this week on NPR’s All Things Considered, book critic Alan Cheuse shared his
holiday book list and included this
collection of essays:
Then & There: The Travel Writing of James Salter, who Cheuse calls “…one of our finest living prose writers.”
The book contains two dozen essays and sketches of
Salter’s travels through Europe and Japan. Among the
memories he shares are stories of his earliest travels as a WWII soldier and a tour of Japan he took with his son.
There are tales from Tokyo, Paris, Switzerland, Austria, Germany and Colorado too. The quote on the cover of the book
reads: Travel writing is something you do for the money, not a lot of money, but working conditions can be
pleasant. Yes, pleasant indeed much of the time, making the low pay worth it, right? Travel is all about the
experience, not the cash, and it sounds like Salter shares some goodies in this one. You can read an
excerpt, courtesy of the nice folks at NPR.
Here’s a list of other books by
Salter.