The Trip to Echo Spring: On Writers and Drinking

Why were so many authors of the greatest works of literature consumed by alcoholism? In The Trip to Echo Spring, Olivia Laing takes a journey across America, examining the links between creativity and drink in the overlapping work and lives of six extraordinary men: F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, Tennessee Williams, John Berryman, John Cheever and Raymond Carver. From Hemingway’s Key West to Williams’s New Orleans, Laing pieces together a topographical map of alcoholism, and strips away the tangle of mythology to reveal the terrible price creativity can exert.

Reviews of The Trip to Echo Spring: On Writers and Drinking

One of the best books I've read about the creative uses of adversity: frightening but perversely inspiring — HILARY MANTEL Original, brave and very moving . . . Her insights shine with beauty yet are shaded by sympathy and compassion * * Observer * * A terrific writer * * The Times * * Full of insight, compassion and unexpected beauty * * Guardian * * Haunting . . . a moving, troubling, gorgeously written book * * Independent on Sunday, Paperbacks of the Year * * Beguiling, beautifully written . . . brilliant and original — JOHN CAREY * * The Sunday Times * * Beguiling and incisive * * New York Times * * Laing's prose is lucid and exuberant * * Financial Times * * Laing is a brilliant wordsmith and this is a beautifully accomplished book * * Independent * * Deliciously evocative . . . This is a highly accomplished book * * The List * *