"I am not sure I believe in national characters. I think it is nonsense to talk about the French being like this or the Italians like that. I agree that one of the flaws of the travel book is this assumption that there is a national stereotype. What I do like in the English travel...

"In the years after Edward Said's Orientalism , the exploration of the East -- its peoples, habits, customs and past -- by travelers from the West has become a target for scholarly bombardment. Travel writers have often come to be seen as outriders of colonialism, attempting to demonstrate the superiority of Western ways by 'imagining'...

"A good travel writer can give you the warp and weft of everyday life, the generalities of people's existence that are rarely reflected in journalism, and hardly touched on by any other discipline. Despite the internet and the revolution in communications, there is still no substitute." --Colin Thubron, quoted in " Home truths on abroad...

Ko Phangan, Thailand Seldom is there just one reason why a person travels, a point Colin Thubron eloquently makes in the opening pages of his Shadow of the Silk Road : Sometimes a journey arises out of hope and instinct, the heady conviction, as your finger travels along the map: Yes, here and here…and here....