the object of exaggerated scrutiny

"His work, and the results of his campaigns and philanthropy, could be seen everywhere, but the man himself was elusive. He hid from journalists, he hated to be photographed, he seldom gave interviews. He no longer attended his own openings, but instead sent his wife and daughter to preside over them while he stayed at home, unwilling to speak—a great example of how writers and artists should respond—letting his work speak for him, with greater eloquence.

"He was that maddening public figure, a person so determined to avoid being noticed and to maintain his privacy that he becomes the object of exaggerated scrutiny, his privacy constantly under threat. It is the attention seeker and the publicity hound who is consigned to obscurity--or ignored or dismissed. The recluse, the shunner of fame, the "I just want to be alone" escapee—B. Traven was one, so was J. D. Salinger—seems perversely to invite intrusion. Say 'Absolutely no interviews,' and people beat a path to your door."

~~ from On the Plain of Snakes by Paul Theroux

a way of dealing with my life

"Lo que más me gusta de mi trabajo," I began, and thought hard, because no one in fifty years had ever asked me this question. And what was it that I most liked about my work? That I had no boss, no employees, no rivals, no competition—the freedom of being a writer? That it was a way of dealing with my life, transforming my experiences, finding ways to understand it—recording life's joys, making its tribulations bearable, and also, in writing, easing the passage of time? Making a living this way, my own way, self-employed—that was something to like. Curious to know more about Mexico, I could get in my car and drive from home to the border, and from the border to Mexico City, and then here, making notes at the end of the day answerable to no one."

~~ from On the Plain of Snakes by Paul Theroux

on the road in Mexico

"'La única gente que me interesa es la que está loca, la gente que está loca por vivir, loca por hablar, loca por salvarse,' it began, and anyone who has read On the Road will easily recognize it as the mission statement of the man who inspired my generation to hit the road: 'The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved.' (The end of the book, seldom quoted, was a soberer reflection:  'Nobody knows what's going to happen to anybody, besides the forlorn rags of growing old,' a condition that Kerouac was never to know, dying in Florida at the age of forty-seven.)"

~~ from On the Plain of Snakes by Paul Theroux

the example of Chekhov

"In making these snapshots of migrants at the Comedor, I intended to follow the example of Chekhov, who, on his trip through Sakhalin Island in 1890, did the same, composing small portraits, before describing the place as a whole."

~~ from On the Plain of Snakes by Paul Theroux