Chatwin was born in England into a family of " ... professional people, architects and lawyers, who did ¬ go in for trade. There were, however, scattered among my forebears and relatives, a number of legendary figures whose histories inflamed my imagination."¹

"[They were] horizon-struck wanderers who had scattered their bones in every corner of the earth: Cousin Charlie in Patagonia; Uncle Victor in a Yukon gold camp; Uncle Robert in an oriental port; Uncle Desmond, of the long fair hair, who vanished without trace in Paris; Uncle Walter who died, chanting the suras of the Glorious Koran, in a hospital for holy men in Cairo.

"[The name Chatwin] had once been 'Chettewynde,' which meant 'the winding path' in Anglo-Saxon; and the suggestion took root in my head [as a young boy] that poetry, my own name and the road were, all three, mysteriously connected."²

From 1940 to 1945 Europe was...