Dr. Taylor Slade
An elderly American physician on holiday with a much younger wife, determined that the trip is going well.
To have an agreeable holiday, and to feel that the difference in age between himself and his wife is not a thing anyone need remark on.
The book
At a glance
- Physician, retired or near it
- American
- Day Slade, his wife
- By ship from La Resaca to Puerto Farol, then inland to the capital
Who they are in the book
Spoiler-freeDr. Taylor Slade is an American doctor of retirement age travelling through an unnamed Latin American country with Day, his wife, who is a good deal younger than he is. He is the book's opening consciousness, and Bowles establishes him in a few domestic strokes: impatient about breakfast, cheerful about the weather, pleased to be seen with his wife.
His professional habit of assessment never switches off. He looks at Mrs. Rainmantle and thinks in terms of what needs attending to. That clinical eye is the thing that makes him useful to the reader and dangerous to himself: he notices, and Grove Soto cannot be sure how much.
What he is not is suspicious. He is a reasonable man in a situation that does not reward reason, and his steady good humour carries him into the mountains and out of his own mind.
How Dr. Taylor Slade Is Portrayed
- Time bombThe novel's first image of him: the hotel clock "ticked fast and loud. Time bomb, Dr. Slade thought as he looked out over the wet greenness of the hotel gardens."
- The fury over coffeeWaiting for breakfast, he cries "Where the hell is that coffee?" in a sudden fury and goes looking for the kitchen himself. The temper arrives and passes within a page.
- "That fog was just decoration"He announces that it is going to be a nice day after all, with satisfaction, and sets his briefcase down so that it leans against his leg. His optimism is a decision, restated whenever the trip wobbles.
- The clinical eyeLooking at Mrs. Rainmantle's matted hair and sweating forehead he thinks: pretty bad. He would have liked to wipe her face — "It was something that required attention, like a child whose nose needs blowing."
- Avoiding the unpackingWhen Day decides to unpack every valise, he retires to the ship's library rather than watch, "aware that he was not going to be able to prevent the operation".
- Kneeling proudly by the poolHe finds her prostrate on a deck mattress, shining with sun oil, and kneels beside her "proudly, conscious of the other sunbathers' interest" — the marriage as a thing to be observed admiring.
If you like Up Above the World
If you like Paul Bowles
Explore authors with a similar voice, perspective, and influence.
Louis-Ferdinand Céline
The doctor of the Paris slums who wrote the century's blackest, funniest novel — and changed the sound of French prose.
View author
Henry Miller
The Brooklyn dropout who arrived in Paris broke at thirty-eight and wrote the exuberant, banned books that ended American censorship.
View author
Martha Gellhorn
War correspondent who covered the Spanish Civil War, D-Day, and conflicts across five more decades; Hemingway's third wife, 1940–1945.
View author