Globe-trotting polyglot

PAUL Theroux made his name as a travel writer, sealing his reputation with The Great Railway Bazaar in 1975, followed by The Pillars of Hercules in 1995, and The Last Train to Zona Verde in 2013.

He sees his fascination with the genre as "A counterpart to the creative process," says the 73-year-old award-winning American author. "Instead of the solitude at home required for writing a novel, the travel writer heads into the wider world and looks for a subject and writes about what is visible - meeting people, experiencing cultures. Then coming home and writing about it."

But travel is not all he writes about, of course, as Theroux's books can also be found in the fiction section - such as political thrillers (The Family Arsenal, 1976) and science fiction novels (O-Zone, 1986).