The Songlines (Paperback, Reissue)

The author couldn't give an account of a trip to the shops without some fantastic embroidering of mundane reality. This blend of myth, observation and outright invention is less an account of Aboriginal mythology than an excuse for the author to let rip. Travel writing has never been the same. (Kirkus UK)

'Songlines' or 'Dreaming Tracks' are what all Europeans call the labyrinth of invisible pathways that meander all over Australia. To Aboriginals, they are the 'Footprints of the Ancestors'; they are bothintricate sources of personal identity and territorial markers. From such ancient line, Bruce Chatwin has been able to trace a great deal about an Aboriginal culture as complex as it is different from our own. The conflict between the two ways of life mirrors that within 'civilised' man himself. Disputes over the right to excavate land that is sacred to wandering tribes highlight the importance of myth and instinct in the human psyche. What might in other hands seem theatrically picaresque, Bruce Chatwin transforms into something approaching the scale of Greek tragedy...

General

Imprint:	Vintage Classics
Country of origin:	United Kingdom
Release date:	December 1998
First published:	February 2010
Authors:	Bruce Chatwin
Dimensions:	198 x 129 x 20mm (L x W x T)
Format:	Paperback - B-format
Pages:	293
Edition:	Reissue
ISBN-13:	978-0-09-976991-0
Categories:	Books > Fiction > General & literary fiction > Modern fiction Books > Reference & Interdisciplinary > Interdisciplinary studies > Cultural studies > General Books > Sport & Leisure > Travel & holiday > Travel writing > General Books > Travel > Travel writing > General
LSN:	0-09-976991-3
Barcode:	9780099769910

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