10 Books To Cure Wanderlust
This year has seen holidays and hopes to travel put on hold, with no knowing when we’ll be able to head out into the world once more. But while we’re physically restricted from exploring the many wonderful corners of the world, there are a great many books that can see us through this odd moment in time until we can travel once more.
The below suggestions don’t form a definitive list, but rather an entry point to seeing the world through literature. Who knows where it will lead you!
A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway
If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast.
Written during the last years of his life, Hemingway looks back fondly on his time as an unknown writer living in Paris in the 1920s. Poor, happy, writing in cafes and in the company of fellow luminaries, such as F. Scott Fitzgerald, he credits this time with shaping his vocation. Through Hemingway’s words, the city of love is illuminating and his fondness of it a testament to how travel plays a powerful role in discovering ourselves.
Flaneuse: Women Walk the City in Paris, New York, Tokyo, Venice and London by Lauren Elkin
Flaneur: A French noun that historically refers to a purely male figure who 'saunters around observing society'. In her book, Elkin begs to differ that only men participated in such an activity. As a passionate wanderer herself, Elkin felt inspired to tell her story and the stories of other notable women in the past, which sees the reclaiming of space in the city even during times in which women were restricted. In this nuanced analysis of urban life, Elkin transforms the image of the flaneur into the flaneuse; of women who were bold enough to pound the pavements of London despite Victorian social mores (Virginia Woolf), protest in the streets of Paris and report from war zones (Martha Gellhorn), plus many more.
This book is a beautiful blend of personal memoir and historical non-fiction. It reads like an academic paper at times but is nevertheless a pleasurable and whimsical read that will whisk you away to historically rich and bustling city centres.
Call Me by Your Name by Andre Aciman
As well as being a beautiful yet bittersweet story about love, which broke thousands of hearts the world over, the setting of this acclaimed novel will also pull at your heartstrings. Much of the events take place at Elio’s family’s Italian villa in Lombardy. The long, hot summer days in which Elio and Oliver spend laying by the water fountain, eating seasonal fruit, sipping espresso in the town square and riding bikes in the country side will sate your wanderlust for a relaxing trip to Northern Italy that celebrates simple living and simple pleasures.
What I Was Doing When You Were Breeding by Kristy Newman
You can't control everything. Just enjoy what the world is giving you.
Kristin Newman spent much of her twenties and thirties buying dresses to wear to her friends' weddings and baby showers. Yet, she personally never felt the urge to settle down. Instead, she sought escape, from social pressures and her fast-paced job as a sitcom writer, so she travelled the world solo for several weeks each year. Falling in love with the planet and falling for local men in the places she visited along the way granted the freedom she so desperately desired. This is a book that speaks to all those who yearn for a life beyond their hometown and the arbitrary life trajectory. Even though readers can’t physically follow in Newman’s footsteps, she calls on us to live the life we want, fearlessly and without shame.
Istanbul - Memories of the City by Orhan Pamuk
Born in Istanbul and still living in the family apartment building he has lived his whole life, Orhan Pamuk writes a portrait of the city. He expresses the sadness that comes of living amid the ruins of a lost empire, a melancholy that all Istanbullus share, as he writes of the gorgeous, decrepit mansions overlooking the Bosphorus. By melding personal family history while also reflecting on the writers and painters who shaped his consciousness of the city, Pamuk’s Istanbul is a triumphant exploration of how place and sensibility can shape us.
The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Safron
Safron’s engrossing tale takes place in Barcelona, 1945. It follows Daniel, an antiquarian book dealer’s son who finds solace in a mysterious book entitled The Shadow of the Wind by Julian Carax, following his mother’s death. Daniel is so taken by the book that he seeks the author’s other works, only to make a shocking discovery: someone has been systematically destroying every copy of every book Carax has written. Soon Daniel’s seemingly innocent quest opens a door into one of Barcelona’s darkest secrets–an epic story of murder, madness, and doomed love.
This is one of my favourite books of all time. Not only is it so deliciously wrapped in mystery and suspense, but it also paints a riveting picture of Barcelona that will quell your desire for adventure in a historic cultural city.
The Best Women’s Travel Writing by Lavinia Spalding
This award-winning anthology currently spans 11 volumes, all of which contain wildly diverse travel stories from around the world. Follow in the footsteps of remarkable female travelers as they share the personal stories we can’t help but collect when we take adventures abroad - stories of reaching out to embrace the unfamiliar and cross-cultural connections, while learning more about ourselves as human beings. A true delight.
The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
People are capable, at any time in their lives, of doing what they dream of.
It’s hard to go past one of the most-read books in history, especially when it’s about following your dreams. The Alchemist is about an Andalusian shepherd boy named Santiago who travels from his homeland in Spain to the Egyptian desert in search of a treasure buried near the Pyramids. Along the way he meets three intriguing people– a Gypsy woman, a man who calls himself king, and an alchemist – who point him in the direction of his quest. No one knows what the treasure is, or if Santiago can overcome the obstacles in his path. But much like the many travel adventures we embark on in life, it’s revealed that the real treasure is found within along the journey.
On the Road by Jack Kerouac
Nothing behind me, everything ahead of me, as is ever so on the road.
For the ultimate road trip read, you can’t go past this classic. On the Road chronicles Kerouac’s years travelling the Northern American continent with his friend Neal Cassady in a quest for self-knowledge.
Kerouac’s novel is emblematic of the Beat Generation and will have you not only wanting to hit the road but travel back in time to the era of jazz.
Love with a Chance of Drowning by Torre DeRoche
For all those craving a chick lit travel story, this could be just the thing. Love with a Chance of Drowning was written by a travel blogger with a morbid fear of deep water – someone you’d think would be the last person found adrift in the middle of the stormy Pacific aboard a leaky boat. But meeting Ivan changed everything, and it wasn’t long until Torre found herself leaving her life in the city behind to join the handsome Argentinian man on his dream to explore the world by boat.
Love with a Chance of Drowning is a hilarious, vivid and moving memoir that is emblematic of the exhilaration of traveling, how it pushes use to try crazy things and how it allows us to grow and develop the confidence to live without fear.
