The journey that has changed me: William Dalrymple

Veröffentlicht: 14. Juli 2022, 11:24 Uhr

Aktualisiert: 09. Juni 2025, 22:44 Uhr

Von: wom87

From the traces of Marco Polos to the dream goal he has never seen - the author William Dalrymple tells us about the trips that have changed him

William Dalrymple was born in Scotland in 1965. At the age of 22, he set off to follow Marco Polos from Jerusalem to Mongolia on foot. The trip inspired in Xanadu, the highly praised bestseller, which marked the beginning of a long and illustrious career.

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Since then, DUFF Cooper Memorial Prize, the Young British Writer of the Year Award of the Sunday Times, the Hemingway Prize, the Kapuściński Prize and the Wolfson Prize.

Last he published The Anarchy, one of the best books by Barack Obama 2019, as well as the book of the year of the Financial Times, the Observer, Daily Telegraph, Wall Street Journal and Times. Here he tells us about the journey that has changed him.

Which region or trip did it impress the most?

at 18 I spent a year with my backpack through India. At that time, Scotland and North Yorkshire were the limits of my view and suddenly I was in India. It was a complete lightning strike.

People were strange, the climate was strange, the story was fascinating, but strange - but it was also very accessible. People spoke English and a lot was familiar. They turned to a television and he showed to the Manor Born.

Of course it is never easy to fall in love with India. It is annoying in many ways: power failures, bureaucratic covering, traffic jams, terrible monsoons, floods, but it never gets boring. It is always interesting. I have fallen in love and have been living in and outside of Delhi.

since then

Do you still have a big dream destination that you have not achieved?

No, not a big dream destination, but a long list of places I want to see. In the eastern half of the world I long to see Borobudur.

I am also very interested in the sanskitization of Southeast Asia. Around 100 BC BC, all of these kingdoms across Southeast Asia -in today's Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia -took Sanskrit and accepted Sanskrit names and mythologies. The Ramayana became its story and that happened without conquest. I want to start and write about it.

alt = "Borobudur in Indonesia"> Pambudi Yoga Perdana/Shutterstock Borobudur in Indonesia

travel guide or not travel guide?

I am a great guide user. You can go and make your own plans, but I think it is very important to bring a travel guide.

Are you a planner or onlookers?

I'm a flexible planner. I have a vague idea of what I want to do, but then I often get out of hand.

What was your most important travel experience?

My journey, which became too in Xanadu, by hitchhiking from Jerusalem to the outer Mongolia. This includes the passage on the Karakoram Highway in Pakistan from Islamabad to Kashgar, which is now much more difficult to do. It was like discovering Cortés Mexico - just absolutely stunning in every phase.

I was traveling in a pickup with all these bearded Mujaheddin. These are exactly the types that you run away for miles or imagine that they will be kidnapped, but they couldn't have been more friendly or generous. They were the most charming, friendliest and most hospitable hosts who brought me to the highway free of charge.

Finally, why travel?

because it is one of the great experiences of life. It is up there with the best sex you will have, the best meals you will ever eat or the jump from an airplane. No question, it is one of the things that enjoy the most joy in life. It is up there with only two or three other things you can do.

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In the Anarchy, his most ambitious and captivating book, William Dalrymple tells the history of East India Company, as it has never been told before, and unfolds a contemporary warning story of the first global corporate power.