I'm constantly running across people who have never heard of books I think they should read.

It's only when you're alone that you realize where you are. You have nothing to fall back on except your own resources.

Travel is a state of mind. It has nothing to do with existence or the exotic. It is almost always an inner experience.

The United States is a world unto itself. We have mountains, we have deserts, we have a river that equals the Yangtze River, that equals the Nile. We have the greatest cities in the world - among the greatest cities in the world. We have a large population. We have challenges. We have an indigenous population.

Loneliness in travel directs you and tells you about yourself. You don't become lonely unless you're alone.

Travel books are all sorts - some are autobiographies, some are about falling in love. Some are about having great meals, some are about suffering. There are as many different kinds of travel books as there are novels. People think a travel book is one thing. It's many things.

For years I felt that being respectable meant maintaining a sinister complacency, and the disreputable freedom I sought helped make me a writer.