St. Drogo's Books

P. VIII - "Writers are bound to speculate about the lives of other writers. Novices rely on established writers' work and lives to guide them from the realm of normal life to that strange condition we call the writing life. Established writers, too, use other writers' lives as reference points as they traverse the same literary paths. But when readers tramp through the private regions of a writer's life, another motive is at work : hero worship tempered paradoxically by iconoclasm. Although modern readers may appear to revere their writers and endow them with superhuman status, in fact they need to be convinced that their writers are not gods. But whatever their motive, they allow the life of the writer to distract them from the work."

P. XIV-XV "Usually the 'Skipper' came below ('Never say down', he explained because coming down meant shoving a corpse overboard into the sea) at seven p.m. He would have a drink - tequila, beer, or Scotch and water - and discuss politics, the news, or the girls' schoolwork. There was no censorship of topics and no forbidden subjects. The girls spoke freely about sex and religion, and he listened patiently always encouraging them. On other nights he gave them acting lessons or taught them foreign languages, German and French. Elena and Malu loved to act with us. Traven made their education at home a game. He had them recite speeches from Shakespeare - like Portia's famous soliloquy - and in this way they became very good at speaking English and at the same time they had fun. With silks and rags they made their own costumes and paraded around the house. Traven enjoyed it all. He had the marvellous ability to look at the world through the eyes of a child. And, of course, in his novels he was able to identify with people very different from himself - for example with the Indian woman who loses her son in The Bridge in the Jungle - and to understand and feel their sorrows and their joys."

P. 137-138 - "... when inquisitive tourists in Mexico ask, "Where is the most notorious criminal district here?" they are given the honest answer, "It is the Avenue of Labor." And if the tourists ask, "Where is the filthiest, most neglected, and most stinking part of the city?" the truthful answer is, "It is the Colony of the Workers." Thus is attained what the street-rechristener wanted to attain because of his hatred and contempt for the Mexican proletariat; and in this way he demonstrated that there are many effective methods by which conservative bureaucrats can successfully operate, even under a government that is honestly friendly to the workers."