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Paul Theroux (born April 10, 1941) is an American travel writer and novelist, whose best-known work is perhaps The Great Railway Bazaar (1975).

Theroux published his first novel, Waldo (1967), during his time in Uganda; it was moderately successful. He published several more novels over the next few years, including Fong and the Indians and Jungle Lovers. On his return to Malawi many years later, he found that this latter novel, which was set in that country, was still banned. He recounted that in his book Dark Star Safari.

After moving to London in 1972, Theroux set off on an epic journey by train from Great Britain to Japan and back. His account of this journey was published as The Great Railway Bazaar, his first major success as a travel writer and now a classic in the genre.

He has since written a number of travel books, including traveling by train from Boston to Argentina (The Old Patagonian Express), walking around the United Kingdom (The Kingdom By The Sea), kayaking in the South Pacific (The Happy Isles Of Oceania), visiting China (Riding the Iron Rooster), and traveling from Cairo to Cape Town across Africa(Dark Star Safari).

He is noted for his rich descriptions of people and places, laced with a heavy streak of irony, or even misanthropy. 


Theroux has described himself in his early 20s—when he joined the Peace Corps and went to Africa—as an "angry and agitated young man" who felt he had to escape the confines of Massachusetts and a hostile U.S. foreign policy. He says he now has "the disposition of a hobbit," and remains optimistic about most of his subject matter.

"I need happiness in order to write well...being depressed merely produces depressing literature in my case," he explains.

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