Bruce Chatwin

A fascinating account of the man behind the myth

Guardian

An epic piece of work of immense satisfaction... Awe-inspiring

The Times

Comprehensively researched, elegantly written, perfectly balanced between the life, the books and the ideas

Independent on Sunday

I take my scalp off to Nicholas Shakespeare. Biographies don’t come any better than this. Eight years in the writing, Bruce Chatwin is a glorious quilt-work of texts, voices and places, joined together with consummate judgement... Wisely Nicholas Shakespeare eschews detailed literary analysis. Such is his skill as a biographer, there is no need

Justin Wintle, Financial Times

In Nicholas Shakespeare he has found, posthumously, the right biographer. This is a magnificent work of empathy and detection

Colin Thubron, Sunday Times

It is so difficult to have any sense of another person’s inner life, but in this vastly enjoyable book Shakespeare successfully shines the torch onto a psychic landscape peopled by the fearful monsters that Chatwin kept mostly at bay by continually moving and reinventing himself

Sara Wheeler, Independent

Of my contemporaries he had the most erudite and possibly the most brilliant mind

Salman Rushdie

Quite simply, one of the most beautifully written, painstakingly researched and cleverly constructed biographies of this decade... Original, intelligent and observant

Literary Review

Shakespeare must be praised for his energy, his always lucid presentation, and – above all – for his mostly poker-faced willingness to leave us as suspiciously intrigued by his strange subject as we were before

Ian Hamilton, Sunday Times

This is an authorised biography, but with none of the inhibition that an authorised biography usually entails. Nicholas Shakespeare has obviously done his research thoroughly – travelled in Chatwin’s footsteps, interviewed all his friends – and, although I am still not entirely convinced that Bruce Chatwin was the most fascinating man who ever lived, he proves quite fascinating enough to sustain these 550 pages

Lynn Barber, Daily Telegraph