SOURCE: Mortimer, Molly. “Following the Grumbling Theroux.” Contemporary Review 269, no. 1569 (October 1996): 221–22.

In the following review, Mortimer offers a generally positive assessment of The Pillars of Hercules.

Paul Theroux has mellowed between the Pillars of Hercules, even allowing a wry smile at his own image as travel writer basher second only to Evelyn Waugh. Perhaps he feels some responsibility as a successful travel writer. This book [The Pillars of Hercules]—too long at 523 pages—reads something like a Ramblers' Association brochure, and that is no insult as anyone who has tried his hand at compressing accurate information knows. Travel writers can produce books in a variety of ways. If Marco Polo, according to recent theories, could produce his famous travels from the comfortable confines of Genoa, with a few brief excursions to the Black Sea, and forget to mention entirely the Great Wall and Tea, why not others?

Starting...