Paul Theroux

My secret life:  Paul Theroux,travel writer, 67.

'What I see when I look in the mirror ... is an unfamiliar face.
Movie heaven is ... The Godfather.
My life in seven words ... joyous, bewildering, rewarded, secretive, familial, passionate, American.'
'Time and place:Paul Theroux'Here!

Interview by Ann McFerran
In 1975, my wife, Anne, and I and our two small children, Louis and Marcel, were living in a small house in southeast London. I felt confined. As Henry James said, every Englishman is a tight fit, and I grew up in a loose fit, in a detached house outside Boston, America - I needed space both as a person and as a writer.


The only place in England where I could imagine myself living was in some old rectory with a big hedge around it, outside a village. But London, I thought, how do I live in London? I could, but only if I had privacy, elbow room, quiet, space – and trees.

But such a house in London is hard to find. At that time, in the mid1970s, property prices had started to dip, and I found a house in a street called Elsynge Road, which runs parallel to the north side of Wandsworth Common, in southwest London. Back then, Elsynge Road was in decline. Every house on the street was different, with contrasting architectural styles up to the 1880s. And every family was different; most of the people seemed to do something interesting in a discreet sort of way. The late actor Daniel Massey lived opposite [he had just married his second wife, the actress Penelope Wilton] and from the back you could see the house belonging to Timothy West and Prunella Scales.

The house we bought was tall and detached, with four storeys, so it was light all day. It was built at the time of the Great Exhibition, in 1851, for a small family with servants, so the kitchen was modest, the kind built for a cook, not a modern family. But the house had all the original fittings and fireplaces: we even found a bell pull to ring for servants.

When I saw it, I knew immediately it was exactly what I wanted. I didn’t have happy memories of our old house in Catford. When I left on the trip that inspired The Great Railway Bazaar, in 1973, I remember arriving back on the boat train to Victoria, then returning to write the book in Catford. It was not a good time.

Moving to the house in Wandsworth was like a transformation to great luck and happiness. The Great Railway Bazaar was successful, and I paid £32,000 for the property. We moved in and we became a happy family. It felt like we were nest-building, starting again in a new house.

The house had hardly been fixed up, but the basics were all fine, and we did all the rest of the redecoration. There were two rooms on each floor, with space for everyone. Louis, who was five, had a big room on the second floor, because he had Scalextric; Marcel, who was seven, also had his own room. “Dad’s study”, as it was called, was on the top floor, away from the family, where I wasn’t interrupted. It overlooked a plane tree in the garden, which was due south. I’d move my desk around from the door to the window. At one time, when I had writer’s block, I thought, ‘If I had a real desk, I could write’, so I went to a Chinese carpenter who made me a desk out of teak log, which I still have.

Many people who live in London really are living in the capital. They go out all the time, to restaurants, to see plays and so on. For me, I was living in a particular house, a refuge, the house on Elsynge Road. I was never out; I was always inside my house, writing books.

And my time in that house was one of great happiness and productivity – and the making of me as a writer. I wrote 18 books there in 14 years, including The Mosquito Coast, which I wrote in longhand very slowly, then typed very fast.

There’s something about children growing up that produces a turning point in a marriage. As a couple, you could move to the country or go to Spain, or you can say: “You go your way and I’ll go mine.” And that is what we did. When our children grew up and left home, our marriage split up and the family dissolved. Basically, Anne said to me: “Go and find your smile; find your bliss.” She stayed in the house and, after a bit, when she wanted to move on, she sold it and moved to north London.

I was an American living in London with no roots, no passport. Moving somewhere else in London never crossed my mind. I thought: “When I leave this house, I am leaving England.”

I vividly remember the day I left Elsynge Road. I was going on a tour to the South Pacific, and I felt a huge mixture of uncertainty, anxiety and sadness. I walked down to the end of the road, thinking: “I wonder if I could make this work? What has life in store for me?” + Paul Theroux’s latest book, Ghost Train to the Eastern Star: On the Tracks of The Great Railway Bazaar, is published by Hamish Hamilton at £20