The Songlines by Bruce Chatwin

'Extraordinary - a remarkable and satisfying book' Observer

'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 both intricate 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. . .

Bruce Chatwin

Reviews

That Chatwin is one of the most distinct and original writers we have is confirmed by the publication of another quite remarkable book

Nicholas Shakespeare

The songlines emerge as invisible pathways connecting up all over Australia: ancient tracks made of songs which tell of the creation of the land. The Aboriginals' religious duty is ritually to travel the land, singing the Ancestors' songs: singing the world into being afresh. The Songlines is one man's impassioned song

David Sexton, Sunday Telegraph

Chatwin is not simply describing another culture; he is also making cautious assertions about human nature. Towards the end of his life Sartre wondered why people still write novels; had he read Chatwin's he might have found new excitement in the genre

Edmund White, Sunday Times

Chatwin delves into aspects of landscape that are beyond road signs and highways, and into a way of living that is entirely alien to the average European… those who are open to a bit of a wander will adore it

Evening Herald

Paperback

9780099769910

September 4, 1998

Vintage Classics

304 pages

RRP $14.99
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EBook

9781448113026

October 31, 2012

Vintage Digital

304 pages
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