The Sheltering Sky - Book One - Tea in the Sahara

Aug 25, 2026

Uploaded by Sage

A literary edition of Paul Bowles’ debut novel, The Sheltering Sky, includes an introduction by Paul Theroux and a structured table of contents for Books One through Three. The material foregrounds Bowles’ life and writing career, his move to Tangier, and Theroux’s recollections of meeting him, depicting his detachment, independence, and uncompromising artistic presence. The contents outline the novel’s chapter sequence, framing the narrative as a sustained journey across shifting landscapes and moods.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryStory & Novel

FormatPDF

Pages247

Reading Time6 h 20 min

AccessFree to download

Contents

Introduction

BOOK ONE - Tea in the Sahara

BOOK TWO - The Earth’s Sharp Edge

BOOK THREE - The Sky

Paul Bowles THE SHELTERING SKY With an Introduction by Paul Theroux Contents Introduction BOOK ONE Tea in the Sahara Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 BOOK TWO The Earth’s Sharp Edge Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Chapter 22 Chapter 23 Chapter 24 Chapter 25 BOOK THREE The Sky Chapter 26 Chapter 27 Chapter 28 Chapter 29 Chapter 30 PENGUIN MODERN CLASSICS THE SHELTERING SKY Paul Bowles was born in Jamaica, New York, in 1910. He began composing music and writing stories at a very early age and at seventeen some of his poetry was published in the French literary magazine transition. At the age of eighteen he began his travels to Europe, North Africa, Mexico and Central America. A student of Aaron Copland, Bowles established his reputation early as a gifted composer. In 1945 he returned to writing short stories, and by 1947, when he went to live in Tangier, fiction had become his major focus. He wrote four novels, The Sheltering Sky, Let It Come Down, The Spider ’s House and Up Above the World; one hundred short stories; a book of poetry; and many travel essays. He lived in Tangier until his death in 1999. Paul Theroux’s highly acclaimed books include Dark Star Safari, Riding the Iron Rooster, The Great Railway Bazaar, The Old Patagonian Express, Fresh Air Fiend and The Elephanta Suite. The Mosquito Coast and Dr Slaughter have both been made into successful films. Paul Theroux is also a frequent contributor to magazines, and divides his time between Cape Cod and the Hawaiian islands. To Jane Introduction The Sheltering Sky was Paul Bowles’ first novel and, although he honed his art almost to his dying day – novels, poems, stories, translations, as well as musical scores – it was this strange, uneven and somewhat hallucinatory novel, and a handful of disturbing short stories written around the sametime, that seemed to locate his fictional vision for good in the minds of his readers. So at the age of thrity-eight he was defined, and that definition dogged him for the rest of his life. Even in his eighties he was pestered about details in the novel. I know this to be true because I was one of the people pestering him when he was that great age. I found him sitting on the floor of a back room in a large chilly apartment in a gray building on a back street in Tangier. It was October, and clammy cold. To drive the dampness away Bowles had a sort of superior blow-torch going, a fizzing blue flame heating the curtained-off cubicle, where he was seated like a hawker in a bazaar, on a mat, back straight, legs out, because of a leg infection. Around him was a litter of small objects, notebooks, pens, medicine bottles; everything within reach, a teapot, a cup, spoons, matches, as well as shelves with books and papers, some of them musical scores. A metronome sat on a low table nearby, among bottles of capsulesand tubes of ointment, and cassette tapes and a tin of Nesquik and cough drops and a partly eaten candy bar and a note folded and jammed into an envelope scribbled Paul Bowles, Tanger, Maroc, a vague address but it had obviously found him, as I had, with little more information than that. With a pad in his hand, he was translating a novel from Spanish. His illness and his age gave him a strangely sculpted and skeletal dignity. He seemed sure of himself, and (as a chronic vacillator myself) I admired him for being uncompromising. Because I did not want to inhibit his talk by taking notes of our conversation, I stopped in a café, The Negresco, on the way back to my hotel, and described this meeting in my notebook. I wanted to make it an episode for the end of my Mediterranean journey, the book I was to call The Pillars of Hercules. I wrote: He seems to me a man who masks all feelings; he has a

FAQs

What novel is featured in this document?

The document centers on Paul Bowles’ novel The Sheltering Sky, presented in a Penguin Modern Classics edition.

Who wrote the introduction included in the edition?

Paul Theroux wrote the introduction.

How is the book organized in the provided contents section?

The table of contents divides the novel into BOOK ONE, BOOK TWO, and BOOK THREE, with chapters numbered under each section.

Aug 25, 2026

Uploaded by Sage