Traveling By Book
May 1, 2008 by Stefanie
I got the coolest book in the mail yesterday from National Geographic. Novel Destinations by Shannon McKenna Schmidt and Joni Rendon will be a perfect read for my approaching vacation. Since my vacation is just a vacation from going to work everyday and I am not actually going anywhere (a good chunk of the time will be spent working on my final project for school), I can play armchair traveler.
Via the book, I will be “touring” more than 500 literary landmarks in the United States and Europe (including Emerson’s house!). I will be making stops in Key West, Monterey, Dublin, Paris, Prague, London (how I wish I could live there!), and take afternoon tea at the Pump Room in Bath. It’s sure to be a lovely trip. There will be no lost luggage, mosquito bites, sun burn, bad reactions to food, or jet lag.
Going to grad school year-round sort of puts the kibosh on actually traveling anywhere–too busy, not to mention most all of my disposable income is paying for tuition. And I really do need an escape. So this book has got me thinking and planning on what other books I can read on my time off. I have Herodotus of course. I have also requested Rachel Carson’s The Sea Around Us from the library. Having grown up a stone’s throw from the Pacific Ocean, living in landlocked Minnesota leaves me sometimes longing for crashing waves and salty air. So a “trip” to the ocean will be quite nice.
If I somehow manage to breeze through all that, I also have on hand Riding with Rilke by Ted Bishop. Touring the American West and parts or Europe on a motorcycle while also meditating on literature, hard to go wrong there.
Now, kind reader, it’s your turn. I have another two years of armchair vacations ahead of me unless I manage to inherit millions from a long-lost uncle or aunt (if you have millions, one foot in the grave, and would like to be my long-lost aunt or uncle, please send me an email!). So, what book would you recommend for an armchair vacation? Fiction or nonfiction, doesn’t matter, just as long as it “takes” me somewhere.
And one more thing, happy Beltane!
Is that goat’s beard? Whoah, you guys are way ahead of us. We had one of the coolest April’s on record and all the plants are way behind.
Oops, how did that apostrophe get in there?! *blush*
I think you should read Round Ireland with a Fridge, but you never listen to my suggestions. :p
Happy Beltane!
I scored a copy of that book too and can’t wait to read it. Of course I’m drawing a complete blank on any books to recommend for armchair travel. Let me get back to you on that
Beautiful photo! Happy Beltane to you, too. (My dad grew up in Scotland, which is why I even know what that is–thanks for the blast from the past!) As for armchair travel, I tend to travel in time, too. I’m planning to visit the imaginary Victorian village of Cranford, England via Elizabeth Gaskell’s novel next. I happen to have a DVD of the recent BBC production of it (starring my favorite Judi Dench), so after I read the book I’ll watch the movie. Maybe you’ll join me!
Herodotus’s “The Histories”! ;p
But here’s a great place to start browsing: http://www.longitudebooks.com/
The website includes both fiction & non-fiction
Worldhum is a great resource for travellers, armchair or otherwise: http://www.worldhum.com/weblog
William Dalrymple has some great travelogues that are also funny (I am partial to funny): From the Holy Mountains, In Xanadu, The Age of Kali & City of the Djiins
More discursive essays that are about the idea of travel:
“The Art of Travel” by Alain de Botton
Geoff Dyer’s “Yoga for People Who Can’t Be Bothered to Do It.”
Rebecca Solnit’s “Wanderlust” (about walking, but also the idea of moving, travelling, meditation on our idea of time & space) and “A Field Guide to Getting Lost”
Should be enough to get you going for awhile.
Happy Beltane! And that book sounds like fun.
If you haven’t read Out of Africa, you will definitely be transported to Kenya! And Shantaram did a great job of evoking Bombay/Mumbai (especially the shadier side). Peony in Love was a really neat look at historical China and Chinese beliefs about the afterlife (about half the book, at least, takes place from the afterlife). Death at La Fenice was a great mystery that brought modern-day Venice to life. That’s off the top of my head. 
Stefanie, I couldn’t resist looking up some cool travel literature for you, particularly not after I noticed a book called ‘Travels with Herodotus’ by Ryszard Kapuscinski, who travels through India, China and Africa musing on the writings of the Greek historian. I’d also recommend Colin Thubron’s ‘Shadow of the Silk Road’ which is classy stuff as he embarks on an epic journey through northern China, Iran and Turkey. Orhan Pamuk’s ‘Istanbul’ is something I’d very much like to read, and I’ve got Hemingway’s ‘A Moveable Feast’ lined up, too. Although the book that people are talking about here is Sarah Turnbull’s ‘Almost French: A New Life in Paris’, which is apparently a lovely read. My husband very much enjoyed Chris Stewart’s ‘Driving Over Lemons: An Optimist in Andalucia’ and said you were very welcome to the copy if you would like it. And the last one I saw with your name on it was ‘Confessions of an Eco-Sinner: Travels to find where my stuff comes from’ by Fred Pearce, which is sort of self-explanatory.
You know I do like to help you with that tbr pile
Oh and I forgot to mention Orlando Figes’ ‘Natasha’s Dance: A Cultural History of Russia’ which is also an amazing book.
Ok, I’m done, I’m through.
I really loved Rory Stewart’s The Places in Between, about his walk across Afghanistan — it was pretty amazing. I also recommend anything by Rebecca Solnit, and Geoff Dyer’s book about yoga (not really about yoga) was good too.
Hello Stefanie! I travel to the English countryside (of the 19th century) on a pretty regular basis with Kilvert’s Diary. I bet you would like it! I also loved Greg Mortenson’s Three Cups of Tea and learned so much about Pakistan/Afghanistan. I second litlove’s recommendatons of Almost French and especially Hemingway’s A Moveable Feast about his life as a writer in Paris where he hangs out with Gertrude Stein, James Joyce, Ford Maddox Ford, F. Scott Fitzgerald and more.
I too love traveling—actual or armchair, anywhere really. So I found myself scrambling for a pen to write down all of these wonderful recommendations and links from your readers. Such a wealth of great information. I love my new life as a blogger! TJ
Some trips to West Africa:
Mungo Park’s “Travels in the Interior of Africa” (1799) - a solo trip across what is now Senegal and Mali. On his return, he has nothing but rags for clothes, and his hat, stuffed with the notes that form the basis for the book.
Mary Kinglsey’s “Travels in West Africa” (1897) - an amazing woman, sort of an early anthropologist, who went to Angola and Cameroon. The passage where she teaches herself to canoe, in her big Victorian dress, is a highlight.
Both books are admirably humanistic, even multiculturalist.
You’re getting lots of great recommendations.
How lucky for you to have a vacation at home! “Restorative” is a word that comes to mind. Armchair travel is one of my favorite genres, and you’ve got many great titles to choose from already.
I second Dorothy W.’s recommendation to read Rory Stewart’s The Places in Between. You may also like the following:
Paul Theroux (Pillars of Hercules)
Frances Mayes (A Year in the World)
Paul Bowles (Their Heads Are Green and Their Hands Are Blue) Colin Fletcher (The Man Who Walked Through time, re: walking the rim of the Grand Canyon)
Bill Bryson (Walk in the Woods, In a Sunburned Country)
Andrew Pham’s Catfish and Mandala
Alice Steinbach’s No Reservations
Tony Bourdain’s A Cook’s Tour
Browse the travel essay section at powells.com, and you’ll find your TBR list increasing exponentially! Looking forward to seeing what you choose.
Wow, there are TONS of great suggestions here! I see jennifer recommended a great one - Bill Bryson’s “A Walk in the Woods”. It’s a great, light-hearted read … I highly recommend it.
For an extremely unique view of Africa, check out Alexandra Fuller’s two memoirs, “Don’t Lets Go To The Dogs Tonight” and “Scribbling The Cat”. Talk about a different point of view!!!
And if you want to be more serious - but still fascinating - try Dava Sobel’s books, “Galileo’s Daughter” and “Longitude”. Of the two, “Longitude” is an easier read (and it’s short!).
I recommend Louis de Bernières’s trilogy The War of Don Emmanuel’s Nether Parts, Señor Vivo and the Coca Lord, and The Troublesome Offspring of Cardinal Guzman.
They’re about a fictional South American country, but they are rich, lively, and hilarious.
All of the other suggestions have been great, and they reminded me of some other actual travel books. One I own, but haven’t read yet: it’s called the 8.55 to Baghdad, and the author in 2002 followed Agatha Christie’s trip after her divorce (she was inspired by this trip to write Murder on the Orient Express). I’ve read great things about it! The others I’ve read about on other blogs, so they’re on my wishlist:
12,000 Miles in the Nick of Time: the author takes his three pre-teen and teenage kids on round-the-world trip to teach them about life outside McAmerica
The Royal Road to Romance: a 1920s American travels around the world
Forbidden Journey: 1935 travelogue of a woman who followed the Silk Road
News From Tartary: a travelogue by a companion of the woman from Forbidden Journey
Frontiers of Heaven: another Silk Road travelogue
Along the Inca Trail: a woman’s Latin America travelogue
Sahara: a Maghreb travelogue by the Monty Python’s Michael Palin
If you want to see reviews on any of those, they’re all linked here: http://astripedarmchair.wordpress.com/wl/global/
I second the William Dalrymple recommendation. My favorite travel book ever is “City of Djinns.” Second favorite is Bruce Chatwin’s “In Patagonia.” However, I will add that the best book I ever read while on vacation was Virginia Woolf’s “To the Lighthouse.”
No worries that you aren’t traveling on your vacation. As Proust said (roughly), the true voyage of discovery lies not in traveling to new places, but in having new eyes. Nothing quite provides those new eyes–a new and different perspective–than books. So Stefanie, whatever book you choose, Bon Voyage!
[...] at So Many Books mentions another book that looks interesting: Novel Destinations by Shannon McKenna Schmidt and Joni Rendon. This book [...]
Sounds like a great book. I have something similar for music related destinations in both the US and UK. It can be so surprising what you can discover.
I don’t think I saw listed above Blue Highways by William Least Heat-Moon. Published in 1982, it was on best seller lists for awhile. It’s about his travels across America taking only ‘Blue’ highways; that is, state roads and older highways that are always in blue on maps, rather than the interstates. He later wrote a book about traveling across the US by water.
One of the most interesting readings I ever went to was by Least Heat Moon. The organizer looked in shock when following the introduction Least Heat Moon announced that he would not be reading from any of his works, that he thought readings weren’t very interesting. So, the entire event was a question and answer period about his writings in particular and writing in general. It was extremely interesting!
[...] 6, 2008 by Stefanie Last week when I asked for suggestions of great books for armchair traveling I had no idea I would get the response I did. My TBR list has [...]
Patrick Leigh Fermor : “A Time of Gifts” and “Between the Woods and the Water: On Foot to Constantinople from the Hook of Holland The Middle Danube to the Iron Gates”
Recounts a journey on foot, mostly, across
Europe in the 1930’s to Istanbul. Beautifully written.
Oh well, you must go to Turkey with Rose Macaulay’s THE TOWERS OF TREBIZOND (fiction), if you never have. And you can have a hilarious adventure in Africa with Stuart Stevens’s MALARIA DREAMS (nonfiction).
Thanks Emily! I have heard of the Macaulay book and have wanted to read it for a long time but couldn’t remember the name!