Mostly an autobiography, the book is composed of five sections that reflect the growing familiarity and changing perceptions of Naipaul upon his arrival in various countries after leaving his native Trinidad and Tobago.

On first arriving, he sees the area surrounding his cottage as a frozen piece of history, unchanged for hundreds of years.

Naipaul's narration illustrates the growing understanding of his place in this new environment and the intricate relations of the people and the land around them.

Miles Malpractice in novels by Evelyn Waugh and for Cedric Hampton in Love in a Cold Climate by Nancy Mitford.

[1] When the Swedish Academy awarded the 2001 Nobel Prize in Literature to Naipaul they singled out The Enigma of Arrival as "his masterpiece", calling it "an unrelenting image of the placid collapse of the old colonial ruling culture and the decline of European neighbourhoods".