the accidental tourist phrase

  • Movie quotes
  • THe Accidental Tourist

“THe Accidental Tourist” quotes

Movie THe Accidental Tourist

“The first year was like a bad dream ; I was there at his bedroom door in the morning before I'd remember he wasn't there to be wakened. The second year is real. I've stopped going to his door. I've sometimes let a whole day go by without thinking about him. I believe Sarah thinks I could have prevented what happened somehow... she's so used to my...” (continue) (continue reading) William Hurt - Macon
“Isn't it amazing, how two separate lives can link up together. I mean two differentness.” Bill Pullman - Julian
“It's wrong to think we could plan everything, as though it were a business trip . I don't believe that anymore. Things just happen.” William Hurt - Macon
“I lost my son. He was just... he went into a hamburger joint and someone came, a hold-up man, and shot him. I can't go to dinner with people. I can't... can't talk to their little boys. You have to stop asking me. I don't want to hurt your feelings , but I'm just not up to this. Do you hear ? Every day, I tell myself it's time to be getting over...” (continue) (continue reading) William Hurt - Macon
“While armchair travelers dream of going places , traveling armchairs dream of staying put.” Bill Pullman - Julian
“Always bring a book as protection against strangers. Magazines don't last and newspapers from elsewhere remind you, you don't belong. But, don't take more than one book. It is a common mistake to overestimate ones potential free time and consequently overpack. In travel, as in most of life, less is invariably more. And most importantly, never...” (continue) (continue reading) William Hurt - Macon
“- Rose: Love is what it's all about. You want to make me miss it. - Macon: Goodness. - Rose: You just don't want me to stop cooking for you and taking care of this house. You don't want Julian to fall in love with me.” Amy Wright - Rose William Hurt - Macon
- Julian: Call it something catchy, " Reluctant Tourist", and you are the fella to write it. - Macon: But, I hate to travel. - Julian: I thought so. So, do businessmen. I mean these folks would rather be at home in their living rooms. So, you will be helping them to pretend that that's where they are. Bill Pullman - Julian William Hurt - Macon
“- Muriel: If I could go anywhere, I'd go to Paris. It sounds so romantic. - Macon: Paris... is terrible. Everybody's impolite . - Muriel: Take me with you next time. I could show you the good parts. - Macon: I have a very limited expense account. I never even took my wife! My wife? - Muriel: I was only teasing. Did you think I meant it?” Geena Davis - Muriel William Hurt - Macon
“- Muriel Pritchett: Just call for no reason. Call and talk. - Macon: Talk? - Muriel Pritchett: Sure . Talk about Edward, his problems. Talk about anything. Pick up the phone and just talk. Don't you ever get the urge to do that? - Macon: Not really.” Geena Davis - Muriel William Hurt - Macon
“I'm beginning to think that maybe it's not just how much you love someone. Maybe what matters is who you are when you're with them.” William Hurt - Macon
“A business traveler should bring only what fits in a carry-on bag. Checking your luggage is asking for trouble. Add several travel size packets of detergent so you won't fall into the hands of unfamiliar laundries. There are very few necessities in this world which do not come from travel-size packets. One suit is plenty , if you take along...” (continue) (continue reading) William Hurt - Macon
“I don't really care for movies ; they make everything seem so close up.” William Hurt - Macon

Grand Canyon Quotes

  • companionship
  • falling in love

Edward Scissorhands Quotes

the accidental tourist phrase

MovieQuotes.com © 1998-2024 | All rights reserved

the accidental tourist phrase

Authors & Events

Recommendations

Great Picture Books To Capture the Spirit of St. Patrick’s Day

  • New & Noteworthy
  • Bestsellers
  • Popular Series
  • The Must-Read Books of 2023
  • Popular Books in Spanish
  • Coming Soon
  • Literary Fiction
  • Mystery & Thriller
  • Science Fiction
  • Spanish Language Fiction
  • Biographies & Memoirs
  • Spanish Language Nonfiction
  • Dark Star Trilogy
  • Ramses the Damned
  • Penguin Classics
  • Award Winners
  • The Parenting Book Guide
  • Books to Read Before Bed
  • Books for Middle Graders
  • Trending Series
  • Magic Tree House
  • The Last Kids on Earth
  • Planet Omar
  • Beloved Characters
  • The World of Eric Carle
  • Llama Llama
  • Junie B. Jones
  • Peter Rabbit
  • Board Books
  • Picture Books
  • Guided Reading Levels
  • Middle Grade
  • Activity Books
  • Trending This Week
  • Top Must-Read Romances
  • Page-Turning Series To Start Now
  • Books to Cope With Anxiety
  • Short Reads
  • Anti-Racist Resources
  • Staff Picks
  • Memoir & Fiction
  • Features & Interviews
  • Emma Brodie Interview
  • James Ellroy Interview
  • Nicola Yoon Interview
  • Qian Julie Wang Interview
  • Deepak Chopra Essay
  • How Can I Get Published?
  • For Book Clubs
  • Reese's Book Club
  • Oprah’s Book Club
  • happy place " data-category="popular" data-location="header">Guide: Happy Place
  • the last white man " data-category="popular" data-location="header">Guide: The Last White Man
  • Authors & Events >
  • Our Authors
  • Michelle Obama
  • Zadie Smith
  • Emily Henry
  • Amor Towles
  • Colson Whitehead
  • In Their Own Words
  • Qian Julie Wang
  • Patrick Radden Keefe
  • Phoebe Robinson
  • Emma Brodie
  • Ta-Nehisi Coates
  • Laura Hankin
  • Recommendations >
  • 21 Books To Help You Learn Something New
  • The Books That Inspired "Saltburn"
  • Insightful Therapy Books To Read This Year
  • Historical Fiction With Female Protagonists
  • Best Thrillers of All Time
  • Manga and Graphic Novels
  • happy place " data-category="recommendations" data-location="header">Start Reading Happy Place
  • How to Make Reading a Habit with James Clear
  • Why Reading Is Good for Your Health
  • Vallery Lomas’ Blueberry Buckle Recipe
  • New Releases
  • Memoirs Read by the Author
  • Our Most Soothing Narrators
  • Press Play for Inspiration
  • Audiobooks You Just Can't Pause
  • Listen With the Whole Family

Penguin Random House

Look Inside | Reading Guide

Reading Guide

The Accidental Tourist

By anne tyler, category: literary fiction.

Apr 09, 2002 | ISBN 9780345452009 | 5-3/16 x 8 --> | ISBN 9780345452009 --> Buy

Dec 18, 2007 | ISBN 9780307416834 | ISBN 9780307416834 --> Buy

Buy from Other Retailers:

The Accidental Tourist by Anne Tyler

Apr 09, 2002 | ISBN 9780345452009

Dec 18, 2007 | ISBN 9780307416834

Buy the Ebook:

  • Barnes & Noble
  • Books A Million
  • Google Play Store

About The Accidental Tourist

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • F rom the beloved Pulitzer Prize–winning author —a n irresistible novel exploring the slippery alchemy of attracting opposites, and the struggle to rebuild one’s life after unspeakable tragedy Travel writer Macon Leary hates travel, adventure, surprises, and anything outside of his routine. Immobilized by grief, Macon is becoming increasingly prickly and alone, anchored by his solitude and an unwillingness to compromise his creature comforts. Then he meets Muriel, an eccentric dog trainer too optimistic to let Macon disappear into himself. Despite Macon’s best efforts to remain insulated, Muriel up-ends his solitary, systemized life, catapulting him into the center of a messy, beautiful love story he never imagined. A fresh and timeless tale of unexpected bliss, The Accidental Tourist showcases Tyler’s talents for making characters—and their relationships—feel both real and magical. “Incandescent, heartbreaking, exhilarating…One cannot reasonably expect fiction to be much better than this.” — The Washington Post

Also by Anne Tyler

French Braid

About Anne Tyler

ANNE TYLER was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 1941 and grew up in Raleigh, North Carolina. She is the author of more than twenty novels. Her twentieth novel, A Spool of Blue Thread, was short-listed for the Man Booker Prize in 2015…. More about Anne Tyler

Product Details

You may also like.

Book cover

Breathing Lessons

Book cover

Nobody’s Fool

Book cover

Revolutionary Road

Book cover

The Clock Winder

Book cover

A Widow for One Year

Book cover

Black Swan Green

Book cover

The Hotel New Hampshire

Book cover

“Poignant . . . funny . . .  The Accidental Tourist is one of her best . . . . [Tyler] has never been stronger.” — The New York Times “Bittersweet . . . evocative . . . It’s easy to forget this is the warm lull of fiction; you half-expect to run into her characters at the dry cleaners. . . . Tyler [is] a writer of great compassion.” — The   Boston Globe “Tyler has given us an endlessly diverting book whose strength gathers gradually to become a genuinely thrilling one.” — Los Angeles Times “A delight . . . a graceful comic novel about getting through life.” — The Wall Street Journal “A rarely equaled richness and depth . . . Delicious humor . . . Without Anne Tyler, American fiction would be an immeasurably bleaker place.”— Newday “Incandescent, heartbreaking, exhilarating . . . One cannot reasonably expect fiction to be much better than this.” — The Washington Post “Hilarious . . . and touching . . . Anne Tyler is a wise and perceptive writer with a warm understanding of human foibles.” — St. Louis Post-Dispatch “Comic . . . Sweetly perverse . . . A novel animated by witty invention and lively personalities.” — Time “Anne Tyler [is] covering common ground with uncommon insight. . . . Convincingly real.” — People

Author Q&A

A Conversation with Anne Tyler Q: Can Macon be described as an accidental tourist in his own life? Can we all? AT: Certainly Macon can, but I wouldn’t say that accidental tourism is a universal condition. Some people seem to have very meticulous itineraries for their lives. Q: Ethan’s tragic death looms over all of the characters in this novel. Why are so many characters angry, at–or at least disapproving of– Macon for his manner of grieving? AT: Because to someone not very perceptive, Macon’s manner of grieving doesn’t really look like grief. Q: Is it simply inertia that prevents Macon from dealing with Edward’s misbehavior for so long? Why does he find the process of training Edward to be so difficult and painful? AT: While I was writing this book, I wondered the same thing. I asked myself, Why do I seem to be going on and on about this ridiculous dog, who has nothing to do with the main plot? Then when Muriel asked Macon, "Do you want a dog who’s angry all the time?" (or words to that effect), I thought, Oh! Of course! That’s exactly what he wants! This dog is angry for him! Q: Would you agree that Edward’s reactions to Muriel mirror Macon’s to some degree? AT: Oh, I think Edward is way ahead of Macon in his reactions. Q: What does Singleton Street represent for Macon? AT: Otherness. The opposite of his own narrow self. Q: Macon, like many characters in this novel, feels trapped by other people’s perceptions of him. Does Muriel see Macon as he truly is, or as someone he wants to be? AT: Neither, really. She sees the person she herself wants him to be; but since she’s an accepting and non-judgmental type, who he really is turns out to be all right with her. Q: Macon’s friends and family are mostly disapproving of "that Muriel person." Is it simply a matter of class prejudice? AT: Class for the most part; but also personality style. To a family so undemonstrative, Muriel would be a bit daunting. Q: If not for Muriel’s persistence, would Macon have made a different choice? AT: Yes, certainly. Muriel is a pretty powerful force. Q: In The Accidental Tourist, you write of Macon: "He began to think that who you are when you’re with somebody may matter more than whether you love her." Ultimately, does Macon love Muriel? AT: I think he really does. Q: Macon remembers finding a magazine quiz in which Sarah answered that she loved her spouse more than he loved her. How accurate was her answer? Was Sarah correct in writing that she loved Macon more than he loved her? AT: Her answer reflected her limited understanding of Macon, I believe, more than the true situation. Q: Is Macon being honest when he tells Sarah that Muriel’s young son did not draw him to Muriel? AT: I did mean that to be his honest answer. If anything, her son was a negative quality–at least in the beginning. Q: This novel explores the vexed nature of romantic relationships. Do the couples that have formed over the course of this novel stand a chance? AT: Yes, of course they do. These are flawed relationships–as all are–and they require compromise–as all do. But at least one member of each couple has found a way to make those compromises. Q: The Learys are at once remarkable comic figures and deeply human characters. How difficult is it to achieve this delicate balance and neither veer into parody nor a humorless character study? AT: In early drafts, when I didn’t know the Learys all that well, I did veer over one or the other edge from time to time. But the most rewarding experience in writing a novel is the gradually deepening understanding of its characters; and once I knew the Learys better, the balance came naturally. Q: Is the Leary siblings’ geographic dyslexia treatable? AT: Speaking from personal experience, I would say absolutely not. It’s biological. Q: Will Rose and Julian’s relationship survive the transplant to the Leary homestead? AT: Yes, Julian will become a funny sort of quasi-Leary, purely out of love for Rose, and a helpful liaison to the outside world. Q: Is there any hope for Porter or Charles? AT: Well, not much hope they’ll truly change, of course. But they seem contented as they are. Q: Do you have the narrative fairly well mapped out before you begin writing a novel, or do you find yourself taking detours? For instance, did you know all along how this novel would end? AT: I map my books out in a very cursory way–say, about a page for each novel–and I always think I know how they’ll end, but I’m almost always wrong. In the case of The Accidental Tourist, I actually began a chapter in which Macon stayed with Sarah. But it didn’t work; something in the characters themselves persuaded me the ending would have to be different. Q: Do your characters ever surprise you? AT: All the time. Q: What do you most enjoy about your life as writer? And least? AT: The best part about being a writer is the experience of learning, gradually, what it is like to be a person completely different from me. The hard part is that for years on end, I am working in a vacuum. Is this a story anyone will believe? Anyone will care about? I won’t know that until I’m finished. Q: If you could invite any writer, living or dead, to attend a reading group meeting to discuss their work, who would it be? What would you most like to learn from her or him? A: I would rather read the writer, not hear him or her talk. I know that from being a writer myself: what I have to say, I have already said through my stories. Q: What are you reading right now? AT: Lately, I have fallen in love with Ann Patchett’s Bel Canto. It’s a mesmerizing novel, moving, amusing, and enlightening. And I am telling everyone to watch for Mary Lawson’s Crow Lake, a soon-to-be- published novel about a family of orphans in the northernmost reaches of Canada.

Visit other sites in the Penguin Random House Network

Raise kids who love to read

Today's Top Books

Want to know what people are actually reading right now?

An online magazine for today’s home cook

Just for joining you’ll get personalized recommendations on your dashboard daily and features only for members.

The Accidental Tourist

by Anne Tyler

  • The Accidental Tourist Summary

The Accidental Tourist opens with Macon and Sarah Leary driving back home to Baltimore in the rain after a vacation at the beach. When Macon refuses to stop the car, Sarah suddenly announces that she wants a divorce. She accuses Macon of being incapable of comforting her, especially after the tragic murder of their 12-year-old son, Ethan . Macon is surprised. The book then flashes forward to after the couple has separated. Macon tries to adjust to the change, finding it strange to live in their family house all alone. In a somewhat compulsive way, Macon comes up with various "systems" of organization in order to manage the household chores. These habits are highly strange, such as washing the clothes in the bathtub while he showers. Macon, overcome by a grief he won't directly acknowledge, also struggles to keep a normal sleeping and eating routine.

Meanwhile, Macon tries to maintain a regular work schedule. His job is writing travel guides aimed at businessmen who are reluctant to leave their hometown. It is an ironic role for Macon, as he hates traveling and leaving his comfort zone in any way. Macon soon has to leave for a trip to England. Right before his departure, Sarah calls him to ask if she can come by and get her rug. They reveal to each other that they have both been struggling since the separation. On the way to the airport, Macon drops off his dog, Edward , at a kennel, where he strikes up a conversation with a young receptionist named Muriel Pritchett . In England, Macon has difficulty getting his work assignments done and itches to go home. When he returns to Baltimore, he picks up Edward and Muriel Pritchett tells him the dog was well-behaved, subtly flirting with Macon and giving him her business card. Macon can only think about Sarah, and he feels her absence as he walks back into his house with Edward.

Weeks go by and Macon is challenged by completing his England travel book. His boss, Julian, starts to call him, inquiring on his progress, and Macon promises he will have it done in a few weeks. Instead of working, Macon focuses his energy on his household systems, devising ones to ensure that he almost never has to leave the house to do grocery shopping. Despite being invited over for meals by his neighbors, who now know about his separation, Macon declines the gesture, feeling that he can trust no one. Much of his time is spent daydreaming about his former life and what went wrong in his marriage to Sarah. One night, when Macon walks down into his basement, he falls and breaks his leg. He ends up having to stay at his family house, with his sister Rose and his brothers Charles and Porter , while he recovers. We learn more about the Leary siblings and their shared tendency for strange organizational habits. We also learn about their childhood, and how the children were left to live with their grandparents by their volatile mother, Alicia .

Edward the dog increasingly starts acting out, eventually biting Julian when he visits Macon at the family house one day. Macon realizes he must do something about it and remembers Muriel Pritchett's business card. He calls her and they make an appointment to train Edward. At their meeting, Muriel is very forward and reveals many personal details about herself. Macon does not know how to interact with her, continually trying to bring the conversation back to training Edward. They continue with training lessons over the next few days. One night, Macon has a sexual dream about Muriel; the next day, when he sees her for the lesson, he abruptly kisses her and then instantly apologizes for it.

By October, Macon has finally made progress on his travel guide and goes to hand it in at Julian's office. Julian has slowly been hinting at his interest in Macon's sister, Rose, and requests to be invited over for dinner one night. He also asks Macon if he can start working on another U.S. guidebook.

As it turns into winter, Macon is able to remove his cast. Despite his recovery, he is continuing to stay at his family home rather than return to his old house. He takes off to New York City for a work assignment. While there, he goes to review a restaurant on the top of a very tall skyscraper. There, he has an anxiety attack—not only from the height, but also from the feeling of being very small and far away from everyone he loves. He calls his brother Charles for help and discovers that Edward has cornered Charles in the pantry. He has to call Muriel from the top of the building and ask her to go to his house to tame Edward.

The dog lessons continue and Edward shows improvement. Muriel increasingly shows her interest in Macon, which Macon tries to deflect. Muriel invites Macon to come to dinner with her and her 7-year-old son, Alexander , which Macon is unsure about, feeling that he is not ready to start another relationship. He drives to Muriel's house the night before the proposed dinner and tells her about the death of Ethan and his mixed feelings. Muriel comforts him and they end up sleeping together.

Macon starts to spend more and more time with Muriel, staying over at her house and becoming a surrogate father for the sickly Alexander. He enjoys settling into this new routine and the strange and foreign atmosphere of Muriel's working-class neighborhood. At the same time, he begins to notice more of Muriel's quirks that annoy him, such as her relentless talking and superficial interests. Macon's siblings start to become concerned that he is spending so much time away from them, wondering whether this new relationship is good for him. Macon finds out from Julian that he plans on proposing to Rose on Christmas.

Muriel and Macon's relationship progresses, with him meeting her parents and ingraining himself into her life more and more until he is practically spending all his time with her. Macon brings Muriel as his date to his sister Rose's wedding. There, he realizes the similarity between the flakiness of his mother, Alicia, and Muriel's own flightiness. Sarah is also at the wedding, and Macon is curious to learn if she has been dating anyone else. His concern with this makes him recognize his lingering feelings for his ex-wife.

In the following months, Muriel starts to pressure Macon to show more commitment to her. She requests to marry him in June, to which Macon replies that he's not ready, wanting to keep things more casual. She also begs to accompany him on his business trip to France, but Macon declines. Muriel suspects that Macon wants to leave her to go back to Sarah. Their two different attitudes to the relationship lead to the relationship's rupture, with Macon going back to live in his old house with Sarah. Macon and Sarah try to resume their former relationship, going on errands and seeing their friends together, but something has clearly changed between them.

When Macon is departing on his flight to Paris, he is startled to discover that Muriel is on the same plane. She has found out his travel information and has booked the same tickets, desperate to renew her connection with him. Macon allows her to follow him around to some degree in Paris, although he has committed to Sarah. One night, he hurts his back and is resigned to bed, unable to complete his assignments. Sarah shows up in Macon's hotel to take care of him while he is bedridden. She, of course, discovers Muriel's presence, and Macon must make a final choice between the two women. Considering how he has never been able to make his own choices in life, feeling always overwhelmed by the chaos of life around him, Macon chooses to leave behind the past and be with Muriel.

GradeSaver will pay $15 for your literature essays

The Accidental Tourist Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for The Accidental Tourist is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

Standing water in the road is compared to a wide lake.

A wide lake, it seemed, in the center of the highway crashed against the underside of the car and slammed it to the right.

How does Macon meet Muriel?

Macon meets Muriel when he hires her to train his dog.

How is Macon described in Chapter 1?

From the text:

He was a tall, pale, gray-eyed man, with straight fair hair cut close to his head, and his skin was that thin kind that easily burns.

Study Guide for The Accidental Tourist

The Accidental Tourist study guide contains a biography of Anne Tyler, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

  • About The Accidental Tourist
  • Character List

Essays for The Accidental Tourist

The Accidental Tourist essays are academic essays for citation. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of The Accidental Tourist by Anne Tyler.

  • The Accidental Acceptance: Family and Modernity in 'The Accidental Tourist' and 'Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant'

Lesson Plan for The Accidental Tourist

  • About the Author
  • Study Objectives
  • Common Core Standards
  • Introduction to The Accidental Tourist
  • Relationship to Other Books
  • Bringing in Technology
  • Notes to the Teacher
  • Related Links
  • The Accidental Tourist Bibliography

Wikipedia Entries for The Accidental Tourist

  • Introduction
  • Plot summary

the accidental tourist phrase

Foreign words and phrases, Idioms - The Accidental Tourist: Vocabulary | 11th English : UNIT 6 : Prose: The Accidental Tourist

Chapter: 11th english : unit 6 : prose: the accidental tourist, the accidental tourist: vocabulary, a. foreign words and phrases.

You have come across the French phrases ‘ en famille’    _  and  ‘bons mots’   _  in the lesson. Now look at the following phrases and their meanings.

a.          viva voce - a spoken examination

b.     sine die -  without a date being fixed

c.           resume- a brief summary

d.     rapport -  close relationship with good understanding

e.           bonafide - genuine

B. Refer to the dictionary and find out the meanings of the following foreign words / phrases. Use them in sentences of your own:

1) bon voyage 2) in toto  3) liaison    4) ex gratia    5) en masse 6) en route 7) ad hoc 8) faux pas

1.          Bon voyage: an expression of good wishes when someone leaves on a journey 

Sentence: I wished bon voyage to my friend for his successful trip.

2.          In toto: totally I entirely

Sentence: My proposal was accepted by the management in toto .

3.          liaison: A person who acts as a link to assist communication between groups of people.. 

He is our liaison with a number of interested parties

4.          ex gratia: as a favour : not compelled by legal right 

The sum was paid ex gratia .

5.          en masse: in a body : as a whole

The government staff marched en masse towards St. Geroge’s fort.

6.          en route: on I along the way

I reached Chennai en route to Trichy.

7.          ad hoc: used for specific or immediate problems or needs 

The government took the decision on an ad hoc basis.

8.          faux pas: improper act or remark

Watching TV during eating is a faux pas in our family.

9.          par excellence: beyond comparison

He praised her as the teacher par excellence

10.      in camera: in private/ secretly

As the accused was only 14 years old, the trial was held in camera .

11.      status quo: in the former state

People always resist changes. They want to maintain the status quo .

12.      magnum opus: the most important piece of work done by a writer or artist 

‘The Jungle Book’ is considered to be a magnum opus of Rudyard Kipling’s.

13.      in cognito: in disguise or by changing your name or appearance 

The prince often travelled abroad in cognito .

14.      deja vu: a feeling of having already experienced the present situation.

I entered the room and immediately felt a sense of deja vu .

15.      a-la-carte: practice of ordering separate dishes from a menu 

You get more choices if you order from an a-la-carte menu.

16.      Via media: A middle way / compromise between extremes 

He acts as a via media between theists and atheists.

17.      Per capita: used to refer the amount for each person

The sharp fall in per capita income was one of the signs of the financial crisis.

18.      tete-a-tete: Private conversation between two 

They two had a useful tete-a-tete yesterday.

19) Carte blanche: Complete freedom to act as one wishes or thinks best. 

We gave the decorator carte blanche to furnish the house.

Here is a list of some words borrowed from Indian languages and have been included in the Dictionary of English. Add more words to the table.

the accidental tourist phrase

Look at the list of idioms given below. Find their meanings from a dictionary. Read the sentences that follow and replace the words in italics with the appropriate idioms, making suitable changes wherever necessary.

·           right up one’s alley  - to be the type of thing that you are interested in or that you enjoy doing

·           drive one up the wall  - to annoy or irritate someone

·           hit the road  - To leave; to depart; to begin one's journey, especially on a road trip;

·           take (one) for a ride  - to trick, cheat, or lie to someone

·           in panic mode  - fear after a night out:

a.          The old man  drove up the wall   got irritated  at the loud noise outside.

b.     We were driving, when it started raining heavily. After stopping for an hour, we   hit the road  began the journey again .

c.           Ramesh gave false excuses for not attending the meeting and too A  me for a ride  deceived me .

d.     At the interview when questions were fired at me rapidly, I  in panic mode  forgot everything   and grew irritated .

e.           I love thrillers and this book  is right up my alley   appeals to   me strongly .

a.           The old man drove up the wall (got irritated) at the loud noise outside.

b.          We were driving, when it started raining heavily. After stopping for an hour, we hit the road (began the journey again)

c.           Ramesh gave false excuses for not attending the meeting and too A me for a ride (deceived me)

d.          At the interview when questions were fired at me rapidly, I was in panic mode (forgot everything and grew irritated)

e.           I love thrillers and this book is right up my alley (appeals to me strongly)

Related Topics

Privacy Policy , Terms and Conditions , DMCA Policy and Compliant

Copyright © 2018-2024 BrainKart.com; All Rights Reserved. Developed by Therithal info, Chennai.

LIFE IS A FOREIGN COUNTRY Date: September 8, 1985, Sunday, Late City Final Edition Section 7; Page 1, Column 1; Book Review Desk Byline: By Larry McMurty; Larry McMurty's most recent novel is ''Lonesome Dove'' Lead: THE ACCIDENTAL TOURIST By Anne Tyler . 355 pp. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. $16.95. IN Anne Tyler 's fiction, family is destiny, and (nowadays, at least) destiny clamps down on one in Baltimore. For an archeologist of amnners with Miss Tyler's skills, the city is a veritable Troy, and she has been patiently excavating since the early 1970's, when she skipped off the lawn of Southern fiction and first sank her spade in the soil which has nourished such varied talents as Poe, Mencken, Billie Holiday and John Waters, the director of the films ''Pink Flamingos'' and ''Polyester.'' It is without question some of the fustiest soil in America; in the more settled classes, social styles developed in the 19th century withstand, with sporelike tenacity, all that the present century can throw at them. Indeed, in Baltimore all classes appear to be settled, if not cemented, in grooves of neighborhood and habit so deep as to render them impervious - as a bright child puts it in ''The Accidental Tourist'' - to everything except nuclear flash. Text: From this rich dust of custom, Miss Tyler is steadily raising a body of fiction of major dimensions. One of the persistent concerns of this work is the ambiguity of family happiness and unhappiness. Since coming to Baltimore, Miss Tyler has probed this ambiguity in seven novels of increasing depth and power, working numerous changes on a consistent set of themes. In ''The Accidental Tourist'' these themes, some of which she has been sifting for more than 20 years, cohere with high definition in the muted (or, as his wife says, ''muffled'') personality of Macon Leary, a Baltimore man in his early 40's who writes travel guides for businessmen who, like himself, hate to travel. The logo on the cover of these travel guides (''The Acciental Tourist in England,'' ''The Accidental Tourist in New York,'' etc.) is a winged armchair; their assumption is that all travel is involntary, and they attempt to spare these involuntary travelers the shock of the unfamiliar, insofar as that's possible. Macon will tell you where to find Kentucky Fried Chicken in Stockholm, or whether there's a restaurant that serves Chef Boy-Ar-Dee ravioli in Rome. Macon himself is so devoted to his part of Baltimore that even the unfamiliar neighborhoods he visits affect him as negatively as foreign countries. Like most of Miss Tyler's males, Macon Leary presents a broad target to all of the women (and even a few of the men) with whom he is involved. His mother; his sister, Rose; his wife, Sarah, and, in due course, his girlfriend, Muriel Pritchett - a dog trainer of singular appearance and ability - regularly pepper him on the subject of his shortcomings, the greatest of which is a lack of passion, playfulness, spontaneity or the desire to do one single thing that they like too do. This lack is the more maddening because Macon is reasonably competent; if prompted he will do more or less anything that's required of him. What exasperates the women is the necessity for constant prompting. WHEN attacked, Macon rarely defends himself with much vigor, which only heightens the exasperation. He likes a quiet life, based on method and system. His systems are intricate routines of his own devising, aimed at reducing the likelihood that anything unfamiliar will occur. The unfamiliar is never welcome in Macon's life, and he believes that if left to himself he can block it out or at least neutralize it. Not long after we meet him, Macon is left to himself. Sarah, his wife of 20 years, leaves him. Macon and Sarah have had a tragedy: their 12-year-old son, Ethan, was murdered in a fast-food joint, his death an accidental byproduct of a holdup. Though Macon is as grieved by this loss as Sarah, he is, as she points out, ''not a comfort.'' When she remarks that since Ethan's death she sometimes wonders if there's any point to life, Macon replies, honestly but unhelpfully, that it never seemed to him there was all that much point to begin with. As if this were not enough, he can never stop himself from correcting improper word choice, even if the incorrect usage occurs in a conversation about the death of a child. These corrections are not made unkindly, but they are invariably made; one does not blame Sarah for taking off. With the ballast of his marriage removed, Macon immediately tips into serious eccentricity. His little systems multiply, and his remaining companions, a Welsh corgi named Edward and a cat named Helen, fail to adapt to them. Eventually the systems overwhelm Macon himself, causing him to break a leg. Not long after, he finds himself where almost all of Miss Tyler's characters end up sooner or later - back in the grandparental seat. There he is tended to by his sister. His brothers, Porter and Charles, both divorced, are also there, repeating, like Macon, a motion that seems all but inevitable in Anne Tyler's fiction -a return to the sibling unit. This motion, or tendency, cannot be blamed on Baltimore. In the very first chapter of Miss Tyler's first novel, ''If Morning Ever Comes'' (1964), a young man named Ben Joe Hawkes leaves Columbia University and hurries home to North Carolina mainly because he can't stand not to know what his sisters are up to. From then on, in book after book, siblings are drawn inexorably back home, as if their parents or (more often) grandparents had planted tiny magnets in them which can be activated once they have seen what the extrafmilial world is like. The lovers and mates in her books, by exerting their utmost strength, can sometimes delay these regroupings for as long as 20 years, but sooner or later a need to be with people who are really familiar - their brothers and sisters - overwhelms them. Macon's employer, a man named Julian, who manages to marry but not to hold Macon's sister, puts it succinctly once Rose has drifted back to her brothers: ''She'd worn herself a groove or something in that house of hers, and she couldn't help swerving back into it.'' Almost no one in Miss Tyler's books avoids that swerve; the best they can hope for is to make a second escape, as does the resourceful Caleb Peck in ''Searching For Caleb'' (1976). Brought back after an escape lasting 60 years, Caleb sneaks away again in his 90's. Macon, less adventurous than Celab Peck, is saved from this immolation-by-siblings through the unlikely agency of Edward, the Welsh corgi. Unnerved byy the dissolution of his own secure routine, Edward begins to crack up. He starts attacking people, including Julian and Macon's brothers too, one of whom, in a brilliant scene, Edward trees in the family pantry at the very moment that Macon is experiencing an anxiety attack in a restaurant on top of a building in New York. Re-enter Muriel Pritchett, the dog trainer Macon had met earlier when forced to work out emergency boarding arrangements for Edward. Muriel is everything the Learys are not: talkative, confrontational, an eccentric dresser, casual about word choice. She lives with her sickly child, Alexander, in a Baltimore neighborhood that is not much less foreign to Macon than, say, Quebec. Muriel is also very different from Sarah. Nonetheless, to the horror of his family, Macon moves in with Muriel. His indifference to his former life is os great that he doesn't even get upset when the pipes in his own house burst, ruining his living room. Muriel, despite her apparent unsuitability, ''could raise her chin sometimes and pierce his mind like a blade. Certain images of her at certain random, insignificant oments would flash before him: Muriel at her kitchen table, ankles twined around her chair rungs, filling out a contest form for an all-expense-paid tour of Hollywood. Muriel telling her mirror, 'I look like the wrath of God' - a kind of ritual of leavetaking. Muriel doing the dishes in her big pink rubber gloves with the crimson fingernails, raising a soapy plate and trailing it airily over to the rinse water.'' Macon, a fairly keen self-analyst, recognizes that while he does not exactly love Muriel, he ''loved the surprise of her, and also the surprise of himself when he was with her. In the foreign country that was Singleton Street he was an entirely different person.'' Surprise, however, is not quite enough; not to ne so wedded to the familiar as Macon. Sarah, the not-yet-divorced wife, though a singularly articulate critic of Learys in general and Macon in particular, finds that all her criticisms do not entirely invalidate Macon as a mate. She wants him back, Muriel wants to keep him, and a fierce tussle ensues, one in which Macon takes a largely spectatorial interest. He cannot entirely resist the suitable Sarah, nor forget the unsuitable but vivid Muriel. The final scenes of this drama take place in Paris, where the two women manage to corner him. Even as Macon is aking his decision, he is reassured by a sense that in a way it is only temporary, life being, in his scheme of things, a stage from which none of the major players ever completely disappear. ''The Accidental Tourist'' is one of Anne Tyler's best books, as good as 'Morgan's Passing,'' ''Searching for Caleb,'' ''Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant.'' The various domestic worlds we enter - Macon/Sarah; Macon/ the Leary siblings; Macon/Muriel - are delineated with easy skill; now they are poignant, now funny. Miss Tyler shows, with a fine clarity, the mingling of misery and contentment int eh daily lives of her families, remind us how alike - and yet distinct - happy and unhappy families can be. Muriel Pritchett is as appealing a woman as Miss Tyler has created; and upon the quiet Macon she lavishes the kind of intelligent consideration that he only intermittently gets from his own womenfolk. TWO aspects of the novel do not entirely satisfy. One is the unaccountable neglect of Edward, the corgi, in the last third of the book. Edward is one of the more fully characterized dogs in recent literature; his breakdown is at least as interesting and if anything more delicately handled than Macon's. Yet Edward is allowed to slide out of the picture. Millions of readers who have managed to saddle themselves with neurotic quadrupeds will want to know about Edward's situation. The other questionable element is the dead son, Ethan. Despite an effort now and then to bring him into the book in a vignette or a nightmare, Ethan remains mostly a premise, and one not advanced very confidently by the author. She is brilliant at showing how the living press upon one another, but less convincing when she attempts to add the weight of the dead. The reader is invited to feel that it is this tragedy that separates Macon and Sarah. But a little more familiarity with Macon and Sarah, as well as with the marriages in Miss Tyler's other books, leaves one wondering. Macon's methodical approach to life might have driven Sarah off anyway. He would have corrected her word choice once too often, one feels. Miss Tyler is more successful at showing through textures how domestic life is sustained than she is at showing how these textures are ruptured by a death. At the level metaphor, however, whe has never been stronger. The concept of an accidental tourist captures in a phrase something she has been saying all along, if not about life, at least about men: they are frequently accidental tourists in their own lives. Macon Leary sums up a long line o fher males, Jake Simmes in ''Earthly Possessions'' is an accidental kidnapper. The lovable Morgan Gower of ''Morgan's Passing,'' an accidental obstetrician in the first scenes, is an accidental husband or lover in the rest of the book. Her men slump arond like tired tourists - friendly, likable, but not all that engaged. Their characters, like their professions, seem accidental even though they come equipped with genealogies of Balzacian thoroughness. All of them have to be propelled through life by (at the very least) a brace of sharp, purposeful women - it usually takes not only a wife and a girlfriend but an indignant mother and one or more devoted sisters to keep these sluggish fellows moving. They poke around haphazardly, ever mild and perennially puzzled, in the foreign country called Life. If they see anything worth seeing, it is usually because a determined woman on the order of Muriel Pritchett thrusts it under their noses and demands that they pay some attention. The fates of these families hinge on long struggles between semiattentive males and semiobsessed females. In her patient investigation of such struggles, Miss Tyler has produced a very satisfying body of fiction. 'Once You Arrive, It's Worse' Macon and Julian had met some dozen years ago, when Macon was still at the bottle-cap factory. He'd been casting about for other occupations at the time. He'd begun to believe he might like to work on a newspaper... He contributed a freelance article to a neighborhood weekly. His subject wasd a crafts fair over in Washington. Getting there is difficult, he wrote, because the freeway is so balnk you start feeling all lost and said. And once you've arrived, it's worse. The streets are not like ours and don't even run at right angles. He went on to evaluate some food he'd sampled at an outdoor booth, but found it contained a spice he wasn't used to, something sort of cold and yellow I would almost describe as foreign, and settled instead for a hot dog from a vendor across the street who wasn't even part of the fair. The hot dog I can recommend, he wrote, though it made me a little regretful because Sarah, my wife, uses the same kind of chili sauce and I though of home the miniute I smelted it. He also recommended the patchwork guilts, one of which had a starburst pattern like the quilt in his grandmother's room... His article was published beneath a headline reading CRAFTS FAIR DELIGHTS, INSTRUCTS. There was a subhead under that. Or, it read, I Fell So Break-Up, I want to Go Home. Until he saw the subhead, Macon hadn't realized what tone he'd given his piece. Then he felt silly. Larry McMurtry's most recent novel is ''Lonesome Dove.''

Movie Reviews

Tv/streaming, collections, great movies, chaz's journal, contributors, the accidental tourist.

Now streaming on:

"Yes, that is my son," the man says, identifying the body in the intensive care unit. Grief threatens to break his face into pieces, and then something closes shut inside of him. He has always had a very controlled nature, fearful of emotion and revelation, but now a true ice age begins, and after a year his wife tells him she wants a divorce. It is because he cannot seem to feel anything.

"The Accidental Tourist" begins on that note of emotional sterility, and the whole movie is a journey toward a smile at the end.

The man's name is Macon Leary ( William Hurt ), and he writes travel books for people who detest traveling. He advises his readers on how to avoid human contact, where to find "American food" abroad and how to convince themselves they haven't left home. His own life is the same sort of journey, and maybe it began in childhood. His sister and two brothers still live together in the house where they were born, and any life outside of their routine would be unthinkable.

Macon's wife ( Kathleen Turner ) moves out, leaving him with the dog, Edward, who does like to travel and is deeply disturbed by the curious life his masters have provided for him. He barks at ghosts and snaps at strangers. It is time for Macon to make another one of his overseas research trips, so he takes the dog to be boarded at a kennel, and that's where he meets Muriel Pritchett ( Geena Davis ). Muriel has Macon's number from the moment he walks through the door. She can see he's a basket case, but she thinks she can help. She also thinks her young son needs a father.

Macon isn't so sure. He doesn't use the number she gives him. But later, when the dog trips him and he breaks his leg, he takes Edward back to the kennel, and this time he submits to a little obedience training of his own. He agrees to acknowledge that Muriel exists, and before long they are sort of living together (lust still exists in his body, but it lurks so far from the center of his feelings that sex hardly seems to cheer him up).

The peculiarity about these central passages in the film is that they are quite cheerful and sometimes even very funny, even though Macon himself is mired in a deep depression. Davis, as Muriel, brings an unforced wackiness to her role in scenes like the one where she belts out a song while she's doing the dishes. But she is not as simple as she sometimes seems, and when Macon gets carried away with a little sentimental generalizing about the future, she warns him, "Don't make promises to my son that you are not prepared to keep." There is also great good humor in the characters in Macon's family: brothers Porter ( David Ogden Stiers ) and Charles ( Ed Begley Jr.) and sister Rose ( Amy Wright ), a matriarch who feeds the family, presides over their incomprehensible card games and supervises such traditional activities as alphabetizing the groceries on the kitchen shelves. One evening Macon takes his publisher, Julien ( Bill Pullman ), home to dinner and Julien is struck with a thunderbolt of love for Rose. He eventually marries her, but a few weeks later Julien tells Macon that Rose has moved back home with the boys; she was concerned that they had abandoned regular meals and were eating only gorp.

This emergency triggers the movie's emotional turning point, which is subtle but unmistakable. Nobody knows Rose as well as Macon does, and so he gives Julien some very particular advice: "Call her up and tell her your business is going to pieces. Ask if she could just come in and get things organized. Get things under control. Put it that way.

Use those words. Get things under control, tell her." In context, this speech is hilarious. It is also the first time in the film that Macon has been able to extend himself to help anybody, and it starts him on the road to emotional growth. Clinging to the sterility and loneliness that has been his protection, he doesn't realize at first that he has turned the corner. He still doubts that he needs Muriel, and when she buys herself a ticket and follows him to Paris, he refuses to have anything to do with her. When his wife also turns up in Paris, there is a moment when he thinks they may be able to patch things together again, and then finally Macon arrives at the sort of moment he has been avoiding all of his life: He has to make a choice. But by then the choice is obvious; he has already made it, by peeking so briefly out of his shell.

The screenplay for "The Accidental Tourist," by Kasdan and Frank Galati , is able to reproduce a lot of the tone and dialogue of the Anne Tyler novel without ever simply being a movie version of a book. The textures are too specific and the humor is too quirky and well-timed to be borrowed. The filmmakers have reinvented the same story in their own terms. The movie is a reunion for Kasdan, Hurt and Turner, who all three launched their careers with " Body Heat " (1981). Kasdan used Hurt again in " The Big Chill " (1983) and understands how to employ Hurt's gift for somehow being likable at the same time he seems to be withdrawn.

What Hurt achieves here seems almost impossible: He is depressed, low-key and intensely private through most of the movie, and yet somehow he wins our sympathy. What Kasdan achieves is just as tricky; I've never seen a movie so sad in which there was so much genuine laughter. "The Accidental Tourist" is one of the best films of the year.

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism.

Now playing

the accidental tourist phrase

Cristina Escobar

the accidental tourist phrase

Society of the Snow

Sheila o'malley.

the accidental tourist phrase

Miller's Girl

Christy lemire.

the accidental tourist phrase

The Monk and the Gun

Marya e. gates.

the accidental tourist phrase

Peyton Robinson

the accidental tourist phrase

Drive-Away Dolls

Tomris laffly, film credits.

The Accidental Tourist movie poster

The Accidental Tourist (1989)

121 minutes

Kathleen Turner as Sarah

William Hurt as MacOn

Ed Begley Jr. as Charles

David Ogden Stiers as Porter

Geena Davis as Muriel

Amy Wright as Rose

Bill Pullman as Julian

Robert Gorman as Alexander

Bradley Mott as Mr. Loomis

Directed by

  • Lawrence Kasdan

Screenplay by

  • Frank Galati

Produced by

  • Charles Okun
  • Michael Grillo

Photographed by

  • John Bailey
  • Carol Littleton
  • John Williams

Based On The Novel by

Latest blog posts.

the accidental tourist phrase

Do You Believe in Magic? In America Twenty Years On

the accidental tourist phrase

Stay Vigilant: Directors Camille Hardman and Gary Lane on Still Working 9 to 5

the accidental tourist phrase

A (Not So) Brief History of Silent Film Influences on Pop Music

the accidental tourist phrase

The Best Legal and Courtroom Dramas

  • Cast & crew
  • User reviews

The Accidental Tourist

The Accidental Tourist

  • An emotionally distant writer of travel guides must carry on with his life after his son is killed and his marriage crumbles.
  • After the death of his son, Macon Leary, a travel writer, seems to be sleep walking through life. Macon's wife, seems to be having trouble too, and thinks it would be best if the two would just split up. After the break up, Macon meets a strange outgoing woman, who seems to bring him back down to earth. After starting a relationship with the outgoing woman, Macon's wife seems to think that their marriage is still worth a try. Macon is then forced to deal many decisions — Justin Sharp <[email protected]>
  • After the murder of their young son, the marriage between Macon and his wife Sarah disintegrates, and she moves out. After a freak accident puts him on crutches, Macon goes to stay with his quirky siblings at the family home, where he meets the spirited Muriel, a dog trainer with a young son of her own, with whom he begins a friendship. When Sarah learns about this, she attempts a reconciliation and Macon is forced to make a decision. — Jwelch5742
  • Macon Leary is the author of a travel book for people who want to travel with the minimum fuss and as little impact as possible on their lives. Arriving back from a working trip, his wife announces she can no longer deal with the fact that he is dealing with the death of their son the same way that he travels: with minimum impact. Macon subsequently meets the quirky Muriel, who it seems is just the opposite to Macon. — Murray Chapman <[email protected]>
  • Macon Leary (William Hurt) is a Baltimore writer of travel guides for reluctant business travelers, which detail how best to avoid unpleasantness and difficulty. His marriage to his wife Sarah (Kathleen Turner) is disintegrating in the aftermath of the murder of their 12 year-old son, Ethan (Seth Granger). Sarah feels living with Macon she is losing the will to live and wants to reset her life. Sarah is also angry that Macon has no passion or loud emotions, he is very subdued. Sarah eventually leaves Macon, moving out of their house and into an apartment. Macon has a bad back that keeps resurfacing. Macon is pursued by Muriel Pritchet (Geena Davis), an animal hospital employee (Macon had met Muriel when he had to leave his dog with her at her hospital for care-taking, when he had to go away on a business trip. Macon was desperate as his regular animal shelter had refused to take in Edward due to his biting habit) and dog trainer with a sickly son Alexander Pritchett (Robert Hy Gorman) (Alexander is allergic to many many things and is almost always at the doctor's). Muriel is very chatty, while Macon is the quiet, reserved type. After he falls down the basement stairs and breaks his leg, Macon returns to his childhood home to stay with his eccentric siblings. Rose Leary (Amy Wright), Porter Leary (David Ogden Stiers) & Charles Leary (Ed Begley Jr.). Rose is super organized and has kind of like an OCD. Macon eventually hires Muriel to put his dog Edward through much-needed obedience training (as it was Edward which led to Macon falling down the basement stairs in his house. Plus Edwars also attacked Macon's employer Julian Edge (Bill Pullman) when he came to visit him at his sibling's house) (Julin also reminds Macon that he is running very late with his guidebook). Although Muriel at first seems brash and unsophisticated (she thinks Rose is Macon's ex-wife or something till he corrects her that Rose is his sister), Macon eventually finds himself opening up to her and trusting her (She is able to train Edward and befriend Macon in the process). Muriel had got married because she got pregnant, but then something went wrong during the pregnancy and Alexander was taken out by c section early. Muriel can never have kids again. Julian, meanwhile is attracted to Rose and joins the family for dinner to spend more time with her. One day Macon criticizes Rose's cooking (she had cooked the turkey at a wrong temperature), in front of Julian. Rose gets real upset and she thinks Macon wants her to take care of the boys forever and is thus trying to drive Julian away from her. Muriel continues to pursue Macon and invites him over for dinner at her place.. Macon is very resistant and tries to get out of it by saying something came up. But Muriel confronts Macon and he reveals that just last yr he lost his son in a holdup at an hamburger joint. Hence he is not ready to socialize yet, nor spend time with Alexander. Muriel quietly hugs Macon and wins him over. She takes him to her bed and they snuggle. Macon spends more and more time at Muriel's and gets more involved in their lives. eventually Macon moves in with Muriel Macon completes his book and delivers it to Julian. Julian tells Macon that he is going to propose to Rose. Porter talks to Macon and tries to warn him and say that Muriel is not good for him.. Macon wouldn't have any of it, and instead finds himself bonding with Alexander (taking him clothes shopping and saving him from school bullies). Macon wants to put Alexander into private school and this upsets Muriel as Macon is not sure if he is committed to her for the next 10 yrs or not.. Muriel tells Macon that he is not sure of what he wants and wants him to get himself sorted. Macon says he doesn't want to get married and this upsets Muriel even more. Rose gets married to Julian. Sarah is Rose's Matron of Honor. When Sarah's apartment lease is up, she moves back into their old home and suggests to Macon that they start over. Macon leaves Muriel, and he and Sarah set up house once more. Meanwhile Rose has moved back as she worried about her brothers without her to take care of them. Macon suggests Julian that Rose has OCD and he should give her some organizing job that she can immerse herself into. When Macon visits Paris for research, Muriel surprises him by showing up on the same flight and stays in the same Paris hotel, recommended by Macon in one of his travel guides. She suggests that they enjoy themselves as if they are vacationing together. Macon insists he is there strictly for business, and although he shows concern for how Alexander is doing, keeps Muriel at arm's length. During Macon's last night in Paris, Muriel asks to go with him, and despite an early flight she tells him he doesn't have to reply just now. Waking up in the middle of the night Macon decides to call Muriel but his telephone malfunctions. Macon gets up and while trying to fix the cord, hurts his back and becomes bedridden. Muriel knocks on his door waking him up but before he can decide what to do Muriel assumes he has gone already and leaves. Mustering the strength to go to the front desk, Macon phones Julian (and finds that Rose is now working for Julian and organized the entire office) to inform him of his back pain. Sarah comes to Paris (This was also organized by Rose), to care and make day-trips for him in order to complete his travel guide. Sarah proposes that after finishing the day trips if he is feeling better they can go sightseeing, reschedule the flight for a latter date and make the trip a second honeymoon to which Macon agrees. However, Sarah tells him that she has run into Muriel when she arrived and as such continues to question Macon about his attraction to Muriel, angering Macon. The next morning, Macon dresses while Sarah still sleeps, then wakes her to tell her that he is going back to Muriel. On his way to the airport, Macon spots Muriel hailing a taxi and tells the driver to stop. Thinking the driver stopped for her, Muriel bends to gather her luggage and catches sight of Macon in the taxi. She smiles, and Macon returns the smile.

Contribute to this page

The Accidental Tourist (1988)

  • See more gaps
  • Learn more about contributing

More from this title

More to explore.

Production art

IMAGES

  1. The Accidental Tourist: Summary #poetry #songs #love

    the accidental tourist phrase

  2. The Accidental Tourist

    the accidental tourist phrase

  3. The Accidental Tourist

    the accidental tourist phrase

  4. The Accidental Tourist

    the accidental tourist phrase

  5. The Accidental Tourist class 9

    the accidental tourist phrase

  6. The Accidental Tourist, by Anne Tyler

    the accidental tourist phrase

VIDEO

  1. THE ACCIDENTAL TOURIST DETAILED EXPLANATION PART 2

  2. CLASS 9th CHAPTER 9 THE ACCIDENTAL TOURIST PART-3

  3. The Accidental Tourist (1988)

  4. CLASS 9th CHAPTER 9 THE ACCIDENTAL TOURIST PART -1

  5. Siskel & Ebert / The Accidental Tourist / 1988

  6. My Childhood & The Accidental Tourist II CBSE II Class 9

COMMENTS

  1. The Accidental Tourist Quotes by Anne Tyler

    The Accidental Tourist Quotes Showing 1-30 of 40. "I'm beginning to think that maybe it's not just how much you love someone. Maybe what matters is who you are when you're with them.". ― Anne Tyler, The Accidental Tourist.

  2. The Accidental Tourist

    The Accidental Tourist is a 1985 novel by Anne Tyler that was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction in 1985 and the Ambassador Book Award for Fiction in 1986. The novel was adapted into a 1988 award-winning film starring William Hurt, Kathleen Turner, and Geena Davis, for which Davis won an Academy Award.

  3. The Accidental Tourist Quotes and Analysis

    The Accidental Tourist Quotes and Analysis. She meant, he supposed, to give him the best of her. And so she had. But the best of her was not that child's Shirley Temple hairdo. It was her fierceness as she fought her way toward the camera with her chin set awry and her eyes bright slits of determination. He thanked her.

  4. Notes From the Book Review Archives

    The concept of an accidental tourist captures in a phrase something she has been saying all along, if not about life, at least about men: they are frequently accidental tourists in their own lives ...

  5. "THe Accidental Tourist" quotes

    Plot - Macon and Sarah Leary have lost their twelve-year-old son during a shootout. A year later, Sara decides to divorce and Macon remains alone. He is a writer. He continues to travel to document and write his tourist guides, until he falls from the stairs and he moves back to the old house of his parents, where his three quirky siblings (Charles, Porter and Rose) live.

  6. The Accidental Tourist Analysis

    The Accidental Tourist is a celebration of the strength inside the human heart to overcome the apathy that is often created by this type of society. Tyler's women, especially Muriel Pritchett ...

  7. The Accidental Tourist

    The Accidental Tourist . Reviewed by Larry McMurty. Sept. 8, 1985. IN Anne Tyler's fiction, family is destiny, and (nowadays, at least) destiny clamps down on one in Baltimore. For an archeologist ...

  8. The Accidental Tourist by Anne Tyler

    The Accidental Tourist was the 1985 novel by Anne Tyler (born 1941). A finalist at Pulitzer Prize and won the National Book Critics Award Circle for Fiction. the novel was adapted into a 1988 award-winning film starring William Hurt (as Macon Leary), Kathleen Turner (Sarah, his estranged wife) and Geena Davis (Muriel, the dog trainer).

  9. The Accidental Tourist

    Common terms and phrases. ... PEN Faulkner Award in 1983 for Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant, the 1985 National Book Critics Circle Award for The Accidental Tourist, and the 1988 Pulitzer Prize for Breathing Lessons. The Accidental Tourist was adapted into a 1988 movie starring William Hurt and Geena Davis. In 2018 her title, Clock Dance ...

  10. The Accidental Tourist by Anne Tyler: 9780345452009

    A fresh and timeless tale of unexpected bliss, The Accidental Tourist showcases Tyler's talents for making characters—and their relationships—feel both real and magical. "Incandescent, heartbreaking, exhilarating…One cannot reasonably expect fiction to be much better than this.". — The Washington Post.

  11. The Accidental Tourist Summary

    The Accidental Tourist opens with Macon and Sarah Leary driving back home to Baltimore in the rain after a vacation at the beach. When Macon refuses to stop the car, Sarah suddenly announces that she wants a divorce. She accuses Macon of being incapable of comforting her, especially after the tragic murder of their 12-year-old son, Ethan.Macon is surprised.

  12. The Accidental Tourist: A Novel

    The Accidental Tourist. : Travel writer Macon Leary hates travel, adventure, surprises, and anything outside of his routine. Immobilized by grief, Macon is becoming increasingly prickly and alone, anchored by his solitude and an unwillingness to compromise his creature comforts. Then he meets Muriel, an eccentric dog trainer too optimistic to ...

  13. The Accidental Tourist

    The Accidental Tourist. Anne Tyler. Penguin, May 5, 2015 - Fiction - 368 pages. NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From the beloved Pulitzer Prize-winning author—an irresistible novel exploring the slippery alchemy of attracting opposites, and the struggle to rebuild one's life after unspeakable tragedy. Travel writer Macon Leary hates travel ...

  14. The Accidental Tourist: Vocabulary

    Use them in sentences of your own: 1) bon voyage 2) in toto 3) liaison 4) ex gratia 5) en masse 6) en route 7) ad hoc 8) faux pas. 1. Bon voyage: an expression of good wishes when someone leaves on a journey. Sentence: I wished bon voyage to my friend for his successful trip. 2.

  15. LIFE IS A FOREIGN COUNTRY

    THE ACCIDENTAL TOURIST By Anne Tyler. 355 pp. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. $16.95. ... The concept of an accidental tourist captures in a phrase something she has been saying all along, if not about life, at least about men: they are frequently accidental tourists in their own lives. Macon Leary sums up a long line o fher males, Jake Simmes in ...

  16. The Accidental Tourist (film)

    The Accidental Tourist is a 1988 American romantic drama film directed and co-produced by Lawrence Kasdan, from a screenplay by Frank Galati and Kasdan, based on the 1985 novel of the same name by Anne Tyler.The film stars William Hurt as Macon Leary, a middle-aged travel writer whose life and marriage have been shattered by the tragic death of his son. It also stars Kathleen Turner and Geena ...

  17. The Accidental Tourist

    The story of a travel-hating writer of travel books, Macon Leafy, who systematically avoids adventure... until he meets the frizzy-haired, stiletto-heeled, astonishing Muriel (she's trying to train his unmanageable Welsh corgi, Edward), who up-ends Macon's world and thrusts him into engagement with life. Anne Tyler's most famous best seller.Winner of the 1985 National Book Critics Circle Award ...

  18. The Accidental Tourist movie review (1989)

    Advertisement. The screenplay for "The Accidental Tourist," by Kasdan and Frank Galati, is able to reproduce a lot of the tone and dialogue of the Anne Tyler novel without ever simply being a movie version of a book. The textures are too specific and the humor is too quirky and well-timed to be borrowed. The filmmakers have reinvented the same ...

  19. The Accidental Tourist (1988)

    The Accidental Tourist: Directed by Lawrence Kasdan. With William Hurt, Kathleen Turner, Geena Davis, Amy Wright. An emotionally distant writer of travel guides must carry on with his life after his son is killed and his marriage crumbles.

  20. The Accidental Tourist

    Macon Leary likes the ordinary. A travel writer who hates travel, he prefers instead to indulge in the comforts of home. His travel guides, authored with the traveling businessman in mind, offers not the points of interest, but the places of familiarity in these foreign locales. But with his son's death, Leary's simple, orderly life is thrown into chaos.

  21. The Accidental Tourist (1988)

    The Accidental Tourist. Jump to. Edit. Summaries. An emotionally distant writer of travel guides must carry on with his life after his son is killed and his marriage crumbles. After the death of his son, Macon Leary, a travel writer, seems to be sleep walking through life. Macon's wife, seems to be having trouble too, and thinks it would be ...

  22. The Accidental Tourist

    Common terms and phrases. ... feel for the oddities of families and the strange configurations of which they are made comes through vividly in The Accidental Tourist (1985). Bibliographic information. Title: The Accidental Tourist A Borzoi book: Author: Anne Tyler: Edition: reprint: Publisher: Knopf, 1985:

  23. The Accidental Tourist

    The Accidental Tourist. Anne Tyler. Knopf, 1985 - American fiction - 355 pages. Meet Macon Leary--a travel writer who hates both travel and strangeness. Grounded by loneliness, comfort, and a somewhat odd domestic life, Macon is about to embark on a surprising new adventure, arriving in the form of a fuzzy-haired dog obedience trainer who ...