What Do Andre Gide, Camus and Pico Iyer Have in Common?

They have all lavished praise on Frederic Prokosch’s 1935 travel-themed novel, “The Asiatics.” I’d never heard of the book until I read Iyer’s essay about it in the Nov. 18 New York Review of Books. The novel, which will be reissued in January, is about a young American wandering in the Middle East. Camus remarked that the book “invented what might be called the geographical novel.” Writes Iyer: “‘The Asiatics’ is a book of atmospheres more than of events (let alone emotions). Yet what makes it stand apart from the works of Hermann Hesse, say, or Jack Kerouac, the other talismans of youth who might seem to be its cousins, is that this narrator is less a seeker than a collector. He’s not going anywhere; he’s just happy to pick up the colorful characters and pieces of philosophy and moods of transport that linger along the road.” The article isn’t available for free online, but it can be purchased.

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