 While in Australia , Chatwin , who had been experiencing some health problems , first read about AIDS , then known as the gay plague . It frightened him and compelled him to reconcile with his wife . The fear of AIDS also drove him to finish the book that became The Songlines ( 1987 ) . His friend the novelist Salman Rushdie said , " That book was an obsession too great for him ... His illness did him a favour , got him free of it . Otherwise , he would have gone on writing it for ten years . " 
