"New countries are something like new clothes. I try them on - do they fit, how do they look? To be in a new place is to find a new self." With these words Donald Richie introduces his
long-awaited collection of travel pieces that chronicle his visits over the years to lands throughout Asia, including India, Southeast Asia, China, Korea, Borneo, and even the far-off island of
Yap, as well as his own expatriate homeland of Japan. From Egyptian pyramids to Angkor Wat to Burmese temples and the Forbidden City, visiting savory markets, huts, and landscapes, meditating
on the stone garden of Ryoan-ji, or just watching a Mongolian wrestling match, Richie moves through space here - bearing witness to poverty tradition, modernization, and hope - reveling in the
freedom to not be himself but always aware of his role as Outsider. In a distinctive prose style - Stephen Mansfield describes it as "aerated, full of sunshine and graduated shadow" - he
depicts an Asia that is passing away, or already gone, captured only here, in the sensibility and voice of a great writer.
