Jonathan Raban wrote literary travel books, essays and novels about journeys that become investigations of place, history and the traveller's own assumptions. Old Glory follows the Mississippi River by small boat, comparing the real communities along its banks with older American myths and literary versions of the river. Passage to Juneau records a solo sailing journey from Seattle through the Inside Passage to Alaska, combining navigation, Indigenous and colonial history, landscape and personal loss. Bad Land turns inland to eastern Montana, tracing the experience of settlers attracted by early twentieth-century promises of farmland. Raban's writing is observant, digressive and often sceptical of romantic travel narratives, with geography used to test national stories as much as to provide scenery. His work fits literary travel writing, nature writing and books about the American landscape, with useful overlap for readers of Paul Theroux and Bruce Chatwin. Read more Less
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