Vacations are often described as getaways where one leaves the stresses of home and travels to a happy, carefree paradise. However, as the best tourism literature makes clear, believing that any destination could be easy comes at a cost.
sarah stodola THE LAST RESORTthat traces the hotel by the sea through time, easily expose the dark side of this fantasy. In a story that begins with the murder of a Roman Emperor’s mother and extends to the current erosion of Hawaii’s beaches, it shows the clear human and ecological damage these resorts cause. Barry Lopez’s Hybrid Memoir-Traveler Horizon demonstrates how these concerns extend to virtually all travel. Although his descriptions of faraway places are impressive, his writing is full of climate-induced existential dread and a keen awareness of the locals whose needs too often take second place to the demands of tourists.
This dark perspective also infuses works of fiction. Take the introductory montage from HBO the white lotus. In it, the camera zooms in on the tawdry wallpaper of the show’s titular resort, showing rows of illustrations tropical plants and animals, which then begin to bleed slowly. Yun Ko-Eun’s satire The Disaster Touristthat focuses on a company that guides his clients through places hit by catastrophes, it is even more literal in its violence. To attract more visitors to a less successful destination, various people associated with the company work together to fabricate a disaster, casually accepting that the locals will die in the process.
In Here comes the SunNicole Dennis-Benn takes a realistic approach, directing her attention to the lives of Jamaican hospitality workers whose work obscures the poverty of the island from its visitors. His deep care and attention underscores the dull psychic cost of being constantly exoticized.
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what we are reading
Maria Jesus Contreras
Beware of the luxury beach resort
“For doomsayers like me, the luxury beach resort poses a whole new set of psychological torments on top of those provided by more ordinary beaches. The entire time we are in our ostensible paradise, I am obsessed with the unintended consequences of our stay, such as the environmental degradation caused by bringing wasteful tourists into delicate ecosystems, and the racist and class issues of displacement.”
Pablo Cozzaglio / AFP / Getty
How climate change has influenced travel writing
“[Barry] López feels the urgency to tell “a coherent and meaningful story” about the threat of extinction of humanity as a result of climate change and social decline, and the ways in which he believes it can be prevented.”
Mario Perez/HBO
“The guests of the White Lotus assume that the world revolves around them. The resort’s décor, striking and somber, proves them right.”
🎥 the white lotuson HBO Max
Peter Marlow / Magnum
This is what happens when society ‘has to work’
“And a [Ko-Eun’s] the satire of late capitalism argues that the identity we find through work is almost always shaped by how we have been exploited, or how we have exploited others.
Frances F. Denny / The New York Times / Redux / Paul Spella / The Atlantic
A novel that weighs the costs of love and motherhood
“Women, especially mothers, make cruel choices in Nicole Dennis-Benn’s novels.”
About us: This week’s newsletter is written by kate cray. The book you are reading next is my brilliant friendby Elena Ferrante.
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