Novelist And Travel Writer Jonathan Raban Passes Away At The Age Of 80

Jonathan Raban, the creative and astonishing writer has passed away at the age of 80 last Tuesday. According to reports he passed away due to the complications of the stroke he had back in 2011, which put him in a wheelchair for the rest of his days. He is now survived by his daughter, Julia; after his wife left him.

Despite his condition, he has voice dictated his autobiography “ Father and Son”. The biography is finished and ready to be published in the coming September. The title itself resembles that fruitful life and the struggles he experienced as a father as well as a son.

Jonathan Raban’s Books Are Based On His Travel Experience

The novelist is famous for his works that fictionally travel through oceanic waves. he became a well-known writer in the 1980s after he expressed his travel expeditions in his writings. The title of his works takes on a journey across the continents.

As it goes through the Middle East of Arabia: Through the Looking Glass (1979); drizzled down the Mississippi river in Old Glory (1981); across the massive infrastructures of British in Coasting (1986); covering the Atlantic region in a container ship in Hunting Mister Heartbreak (1991); romancing in the beaches of Montana Bad Land: An American Romance (1996).

His last travelogue was heavily based on his failed marriage and responsibility as a father in the book ‘Passage to Juneau’.

All his works are based on his travel experience. His travel experiences enable him to open to the rich culture of different countries.

He experiences living through them to extract their perspective. Thus, it makes him acquire clarity in his writing.

Some of his Travelogue are based on true incidents such as in Hunting Mister Heartbreak: A Discovery of America written on his rediscovery following the footsteps of the European immigrants. This travelogue also won the 1991 Thomas Book Travel Award. 

The perspective view of the personal experiences of the reader was also highlighted in some of his Novels as he witnessed the victory of Ronald Reagan in the 1980 presidential election.

As he ambled down the Mississippi river in a sixteen-foot motorboat to fulfill his childhood dream. In the Coasting, he scribbled down the turmoil experience as he went on to witness Britain entering the Falklands War.

The Norfolk-born writer has a limited collection of Novels, Foreign Land (1985), Waxwings (2003), and Surveillance (2006).

The accolades winner has a collection of essays he wrote about the London Bombings in 2005, President Barak Obama’s winning strategy, and America’s authoritarianism.

His most recent essay was published in 2017, which is a sharp analysis of the film, Dunkirk directed by Christopher Nolan; and his father’s experience in world war II.

The acclaimed writer has received a lot of honors for his works. He gained positive criticism for his work.

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He won strings of awards to name, the National Book Critics Circle Award for the finest book, the Royal Society of Literature Heinemann award, Thomas Cook Travel Book Award on multiple occasions and among others.

Before he became an expatriate writer, was a freelance writer who moved to London for graduation at the University of Hull, where he became acquainted with the poet Philip Larkin.

Before his travel, he taught literature at Aberystwyth University in Wales and the University of East Anglia in England furthermore, he played radio for the BBC and wrote criticism for London magazines and The New York Review of books.

The travel writer was born on June 14, 1942, in Norfolk, England to the Rev. Peter and Monica. He was raised in vicarages, among the clergy as his father was a member of the group.

His mother wrote short stories for a magazine before her marriage that enabled her to provide for the family and herself.

Though he had left his stamp in the field of literature, the entire world is saddened by his demise.