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Rating: Summary: A slight improvement on Bowles' autobiography Review: Bowles' autobiography "Without Stopping" has been referred to as "Without Telling" by Burroughs. Invisible Spectator follows it step-by-step, especially with regard to the early years. Additions to what Bowles fans want to know are largely limited to some speculations about Mr. Bowles' sexual relationships and a bits of new information from letters, interviews, and obscure publications. Historical context should have been provided given that Mr. Bowles was born in 1910, almost ninety years ago.The last few decades are glossed over, especially considering the blow-by-blow account of the early years of career-building and travel. Again, these events are known largely from Mr. Bowles' autobiography and Invisible Spectator adds little. Little light is shed on the later years after Mrs. Bowles' death in the 1970s. These years have been highly productive for the subject, and much more interesting to this reader than the virtually prehistoric youth of Mr. Bowles. From the Beats on, the biography serves up the skimpiest information. If you have never read anything about Paul Bowles you will be entranced as his life is fascinating. If you have, there's little new here. The author is a fan, and a biography by a detractor would be much more fun. Regardless, cheers to Mr. Paul Bowles for letting the biographer have access to personal information. I wish he had done a more interesting job with it.
Rating: Summary: Where reason does not go Review: Paul Bowles lived in Morocco for a reason, he embraced the mystery of it,perhaps enjoyed losing his western self in it, and there is no solving in any easy rational way the mystery that is Paul Bowles. But this is a great gathering of the known facts. I appreciate the lack of speculation and reading into things ....the author allows you to accompany him through this life decade by decade, sticking to what is known. And Bowles, however good your guide, remains a territory for the most part unknown. It may be worthwhile to compare this to Paul Bowles own autobiography Without Stopping published in early seventies. In this biography you get a picture of Paul as a child, as well as a restless young man who cannot resist the call to Europe. You get Paul as composer of numerous film scores, poems, and a general idea of this middle period before that better known period as writer marked by the publication of that first book Sheltering Sky. Also there is an interesting portrait of Jane, his talented and troubled wife. And a picture of Paul at work with his protege Mohammed Mrabet whose oral tales he transcribed(including:Love With a Few Hairs, Lemon, Boy Who Caught Fire, others). This will give you a very good idea of Paul as glimpsed by an outsider as it is a competent and readable dossier of facts and dates. There are more speculative works about Paul Bowles available but really I think the fiction is the place to go. There you will find the most interesting Bowles, the composer of tales and mysteries, even riddles of what it is to be human. The story of Paul's life is interesting and perhaps it will help some who like to interpret stories with the support of biographical data but ultimately the facts in this case anyway do not go very far.
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