"She was part of the 'stunt girl' movement that was very important in the 1880s and 1890s as these big, mass-circulation yellow journalism papers came into the fore." -Brooke Kroeger Around the World in Seventy-Two Days (1890) is a travel narrative by American investigative journalist Nellie Bly. Proposed as a recreation of the journey undertaken by Phileas Fogg in Jules Verne's Around the World in Eighty Days (1873), Bly's journey was covered in Joseph Pulitzer's popular newspaper the New York World, inspiring countless others to attempt to surpass her record. At the time, readers at home were encouraged to estimate the hour and day of Bly's arrival, and a popular board game was released in commemoration of her undertaking. Embarking from Hoboken, noted investigative journalist Nellie Bly began a voyage that would take her around the globe. Bringing only a change of clothes, money, and a small travel bag, Bly travelled by steamship and train through England, France-where she met Jules Verne-Italy, the Suez Canal, Ceylon, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Japan. Sending progress reports via telegraph, she made small reports back home while recording her experiences for publication upon her return. Despite several setbacks due to travel delays in Asia, Bly managed to beat her estimated arrival time by several days despite making unplanned detours, such as visiting a Chinese leper colony, along the way. Unbeknownst to Bly, her trip had inspired Cosmopolitan's Elizabeth Brisland to make a similar circumnavigation beginning on the exact day, launching a series of copycat adventures by ambitious voyagers over the next few decades. Despite being surrounded by this air of popularity and competition, however, Bly took care to make her journey worthwhile, showcasing her skill as a reporter and true pioneer of investigative journalism. With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Nellie Bly's Around the World in Seventy-Two Days is a classic work of American travel literature reimagined for modern readers.

The Cruise of the Snark (1911) is a work of travel literature by American writer Jack London. In 1906, after achieving early success as an author of novels and short stories, London began dreaming of the adventures of his youth. Inspired, he spent a fortune to build a 45-foot yacht complete with two sails and a 70-horsepower engine, powerful enough to carry him across the Pacific. Envisioning a seven-year journey, London and his wife Charmian set sail on the Snark with a small crew in 1907. Over the next two years, they would visit Hawaii-where London learned to surf and visited a leper colony-and the Marquesas Islands-made famous by Herman Melville's first novel, Typee. Other stops included Tahiti, Bora Bora, Fiji, Samoa, and the Solomon Islands. During the voyage, London learned the art of sailing and celestial navigation, ensuring that his travelogue-which he filled with photographs from the journey-would be authentic and instructive. In 1909, the Snark was forced to end its voyage in Guadalcanal so that London, suffering from infection, could be taken to a hospital in Sydney. To help cover costs, the Snark was sold in Australia in 1909, and the Londons returned to America via Ecuador later that year. In addition to The Cruise of the Snark, London would publish numerous essays and articles about the trip, and his wife Charmian also wrote three books of her own on the subject. With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Jack London's The Cruise of the Snark is a classic of American literature reimagined for modern readers.

The Spirit of Rome (1906) is a memoir by Vernon Lee. Published at the height of her career as a leading proponent of Aestheticism and scholar of the Italian Renaissance, The Spirit of Rome is a captivating meditation on the author's experiences in Rome. Raised in the city, she returns as an adult to find it as mysterious and magical as before, a place where any day could offer a chance to lose or discover oneself in history, art, or unrivalled beauty. A principled feminist and committed pacifist, Lee was virtually blacklisted by critics and publishers following her opposition to the First World War. Through the efforts of dedicated scholars, however, interest in her works has increased over the past several decades, granting her the readership she deserves as a master of literary horror. "I was brought up in Rome, from the age of twelve to that of seventeen, but did not return there for many years afterwards. I discovered it anew for myself, while knowing all its sites and its details; discovered, that is to say, its meaning to my thoughts and feelings." Vernon Lee's world is one where ghosts and humans walk together, often without taking notice of one another. Although she is more widely known for her stories of supernatural horror, Lee was also a gifted art historian and travel writer. In these diary entries written over the course of a decade, she returns to the city of Rome, where she spent the formative years of her youth. Walking through villas and the Vatican, standing on cobblestone streets or in the hollow expanse of the Pantheon, she discovers herself anew in the same ancient places, filled with the ghosts of lost friends and lovers, of the woman she was long ago. With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Vernon Lee's The Spirit of Rome is a classic work of British literature reimagined for modern readers.

Set in 1867, The Innocents Abroad is a travel book that follows a group of Americans from New York City to the renowned Holy Land. Throughout the journey, author Mark Twain uses humor and wit to make astute observations about the diverse people and legendary locales. Described as the "Great Pleasure Excursion," Twain and his traveling companions visit some of the most illustrious cities in the world. They make stops in Italy, France, and Greece as well as modern-day Israel and Ukraine. With each trip, the author notes the contrast between expectation and reality. He critiques the misrepresentation of cultural sites and events with notable irony and disillusion. The retelling of a worldly expedition through an American lens made >The Innocents Abroad a massive commercial success. It's one Twain's best-selling books and became a staple within the travel genre. Readers will thoroughly enjoy the author's enlightening take on the Old World and public perception. With an eye-catching new cover, and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of The Innocents Abroad is both modern and readable.

Compiled during a three-month stay in Granada, Spain, Tales of the Alhambra assembles descriptions, myths, and narratives of historical events. After completing a literary project in Madrid, author Washington Irving traveled to Granada, Spain. Immediately taken by its beauty and extravagance, Irving requested a travel guide and began filling notebooks and journals with his observations and description of the magnificent setting. Beginning with an expedition through the Andalusian mountains on horseback, cherishing the grandeur of the nature, Irving took his time to enjoy and observe the landscape and culture of the country. After their horseback ride through the mountains, Irving and his guide stopped at an inn for a drink. During their stay, Irving witnessed artistic culture through music and dance, noting how the locals seemed to celebrate every-day occurrences, creating a happy environment. Upon entering the city, Irving requested permission from the governor to stay at the Alhambra palace. Originally built on the ruins of Roman buildings, the Alhambra was a small fortress built in 889 CE, and had been largely ignored and forgotten by the time Irving arrived in Granada. While staying in the Alhambra, Irving explored the abandoned palace and recollected the myths set within its walls, recording every detail of its architecture, story, and mystery. The Alhambra palace had been mostly forgotten, and left unmaintained until Washington Irving's narrative and recollections revived interest. Upon its original publication in 1832, Washington Irving's Tales of the Alhambra piqued the curiosity of readers who were completely engrossed in Irving's description of the previously abandoned fortress. With delicate prose and intricate detail, Tales of the Alhambra appeal to readers' sense of adventure, and allows its audience to explore the wonders of Granada, Spain alongside Washington Irving. This edition of Washington Irving's Tales of the Alhambra features a new, eye-catching cover design and is printed in a font that is both modern and readable, inviting contemporary audiences to divulge in the grandeur and beauty of a medieval fortress.

A travel book by a reflective and observant resident of Oman at the end of World War II giving a very interesting account of the topography, races, customs and industries of the then Persian Gulf, inevitably throwing much light on the British influences and interest in the region.

Few Westerners have succeeded in identifying themselves so completely with Arabian life as the author of this volume, which was first published in 1928. He went to Arabia for no political, humanitarian, or reasonable purpose but purely for the joy of it.

In 2016, while working as a journalist in Yangon, Clare Hammond discovered an obscure map that showed a web of new railways spanning the length and breadth of the country - railways not shown on any other publicly available maps. She was determined to uncover the railways' origins, purpose, and most of all, the silence that surrounded them. She would spend three months travelling on these mysterious railways, and the next five years piecing their story together.

Her journey would take her from Myanmar's tropical south to the embattled mountain towns that border India and China. In dilapidated carriages, along tracks in disrepair, through contested ethnic states and former sites of forced labour, visiting temples, tea shops and festivals, Clare encountered a colourful and contradictory Myanmar through the stories of its people. Simultaneously a lush and evocative travelogue, an unsparing account of Myanmar's recent history, and an astonishing, conversation-shifting engagement with Britain's colonial legacy, On the Shadow Tracks is that rare and necessary thing: a book that finds and tells the truth.

Sheds new light on the importance of the diaries of Xu Xiake (1587-1641), a compulsive traveller who spent a lifetime visiting and writing about China's 'beauty spots'.

This guide to collecting books on Japan, in English, is organized alphabetically and includes listings of major writers, together with historical and cultural notes. The work provides in an easy-to-use format, a list of obtainable books (both in print and out of print) which form the core of a serious collection. Additionally, the bibliographic listing, the biographic sketches of the more prominent authors, and cultural and historical commentaries should be useful to the researcher.

This guide to collecting books on Japan, in English, is organized alphabetically and includes listings of major writers, together with historical and cultural notes. The work provides in an easy-to-use format, a list of obtainable books (both in print and out of print) which form the core of a serious collection. Additionally, the bibliographic listing, the biographic sketches of the more prominent authors, and cultural and historical commentaries should be useful to the researcher.

Through the performance ritual, the audience vicariously experiences the freedom, cultural risks, and utopian possibilities that society has denied them. Audience members are encouraged to touch us, smell us, feed us, defy us. In this strange millenial ceremony, the pandora box opens and the post-colonial demons are unleashed. - Guillermo Gomez-Pena's Performance Diaries
Guillermo Gomez-Pena has been variously described as among the most significant of late-twentieth-century performance artists - The Village Voice; a peacemaker in the worlds culture clash - Vanity Fair; and a wizard of language - The Chicago Tribune. He is without doubt, a unique outsider-artist who crosses the border and talks back.
In Dangerous Bordercrossers, Gomez-Pena continues his epic, artistic journey through globalisation, the commodification of identity, and the continuing culture wars. His writings, like his performances, point towards a borderless future and a poetics of hybridity.
This latest anthology of his performance chronicles, diary entries, poems, essays, and texts, sheds an extraordinary light on the life and work of this migrant provocateur. He documents and illuminates his brilliantly inventive collaborations with Roberto Sifuentes and Sara Shelton-Mann, among others, and reveals, for the first time, what it's like to be a Chicano on the road.
Dangerous Bordercrossers is at once sexy, scary and inspiring. Be prepared to be provoked.

Through the performance ritual, the audience vicariously experiences the freedom, cultural risks, and utopian possibilities that society has denied them. Audience members are encouraged to touch us, smell us, feed us, defy us. In this strange millenial ceremony, the pandora box opens and the post-colonial demons are unleashed. - Guillermo Gomez-Pena's Performance Diaries
Guillermo Gomez-Pena has been variously described as among the most significant of late-twentieth-century performance artists - The Village Voice; a peacemaker in the worlds culture clash - Vanity Fair; and a wizard of language - The Chicago Tribune. He is without doubt, a unique outsider-artist who crosses the border and talks back.
In Dangerous Bordercrossers, Gomez-Pena continues his epic, artistic journey through globalisation, the commodification of identity, and the continuing culture wars. His writings, like his performances, point towards a borderless future and a poetics of hybridity.
This latest anthology of his performance chronicles, diary entries, poems, essays, and texts, sheds an extraordinary light on the life and work of this migrant provocateur. He documents and illuminates his brilliantly inventive collaborations with Roberto Sifuentes and Sara Shelton-Mann, among others, and reveals, for the first time, what it's like to be a Chicano on the road.
Dangerous Bordercrossers is at once sexy, scary and inspiring. Be prepared to be provoked.

First published more than thirty years ago, Paul Theroux's strange, unique, and hugely entertaining railway odyssey has become a modern classic of travel literature. Here Theroux recounts his early adventures on an unusual grand continental tour. Asia's fabled trains -- the Orient Express, the Khyber Pass Local, the Frontier Mail, the Golden Arrow to Kuala Lumpur, the Mandalay Express, the Trans-Siberian Express -- are the stars of a journey that takes him on a loop eastbound from London's Victoria Station to Tokyo Central, then back from Japan on the Trans-Siberian. Brimming with Theroux's signature humor and wry observations, this engrossing chronicle is essential reading for both the ardent adventurer and the armchair traveler.

"When I first committed to three full months in El Salvador, the feeling that I was signing up for the equivalent of marriage and reproduction was assuaged only by the awareness that, come March 2020, I'd be dashing around Mexico before flying to Istanbul and resuming freneticism in that hemisphere. Little did I know that the scribbled itinerary would never come to fruition, and that I'd only get as far as the coastal village of Zipolite in the Mexican state of Oaxaca, where March 13-25 would turn into March 13 until further notice." Since leaving her American homeland in 2003 Belen Fernandez had been an inveterate traveler. Ceaselessly wandering the world, the only constant in her itinerary was a conviction never to return to the country of her childhood. Then the COVID-19 lockdown happened and Fernandez found herself stranded in a small village on the Pacific coast of Mexico. This charming, wryly humorous account of nine months stuck in one place nevertheless roams freely: over reflections on previous excursions to the wilder regions of North Africa, Asia and Eastern Europe; over her new-found friendship with Javier, the mezcal-drinking, chain-smoking near-septuagenarian she encounters in his plastic chair on Mexico's only clothing-optional beach; over her protracted struggle to obtain a life-saving supply of yerba mate; and over, literally, the rope of a COVID-19 checkpoint, set up directly outside her front door and manned by armed guards who require her to don a mask every time she returns home.

The eight feet belong to Dervla Murphy, her nine-year-old daughter Rachel and Juana, an elegant mule, who together clambered the length of Peru, from Cajamarca near the border with Ecuador, to Cuzco, the ancient Inca capital, over 1300 miles to the south. With only the most basic necessities to sustain them and spending most of their time above 10,000 feet, their journey was marked by extreme discomfort, occasional danger and even the temporary loss of Juana over a precipice. Yet mother and daughter, a formidable duo, were unflagging in their sympathetic response to the perilous beauty and impoverished people of the Andes. In this extraordinary adventure, Dervla Murphy is at her intrepid best, facing up to the terrors, horrors and joys of her journey along the mountain paths.

Since publishing the original edition of A Woman's World in 1995, Travelers' Tales has been the recognized national leader in women's travel literature, and with the launch of the annual series The Best Travel Writing in 2004, the obvious next step was an annual collection of the best women's travel writing of the year. This title is the eleventh in that series The Best Women's Travel Writing presenting stimulating, inspiring, and uplifting adventures from women who have traveled to the ends of the earth to discover new places, peoples, and facets of themselves. The common threads connecting these stories are a female perspective and fresh, compelling storytelling to make the reader laugh, weep, wish she were there, or be glad she wasn't. The points of view and perspectives are global, and themes are as eclectic as in all of our books, including stories that encompass spiritual growth, hilarity and misadventure, high adventure, romance, solo journeys, stories of service to humanity, family travel, and encounters with exotic cuisine. The 31 true travel stories in this year's collection are, as always, wildly diverse in theme and location. They tell of places like California and Cuba, Switzerland and Singapore, Iran and Iceland, Montana and Mexico and Mongolia and Mali, our own back yards and some of the farthest, most extreme corners of the world. They are the personal stories we can't help but collect when we travel, stories of reaching out to embrace the unfamiliar and creating cross-cultural connections while learning more about ourselves. In The Best Women's Travel Writing, Volume 11, you will: go scuba diving with sharks in Palau cook for Syrian refugees in Greece be the first American to play pro basketball in the Czech Republic anger a nun in Ethiopia go whitewater rafting on the Nile in Uganda help slaughter a pig in Hungary realize your limits of filial piety in Singapore seek healing at the hands of a witchdoctor in Mexico feast on rancid food in Iceland avoid hypothermia by spooning in Mongolia fall in love in Nepal ... and much, much more.

The story behind the best-selling book One Man’s Wilderness and how author Sam Keith and Dick Proenneke met and forged an everlasting friendship. “Sam, you know right well you don’t want to leave this country. Don’t give up on it. Me and you got to figure something out.” After serving as a US Marine during World War II and attending college on the GI Bill, Sam Keith decided to seek adventure in Alaska as a laborer on the Adak Navy base. There he befriended Dick Proenneke, whose shared love of the outdoors, hard work, and self-reliance quickly bonded an alliance between the two. Together they explored the wilds of South Central Alaska while working on the Navy base, hunting and fishing with friends and breathing in the great outdoors. Keith was ready to leave after three years of finding almost everything he sought—not realizing then how his fate was intrinsically tied to his friend’s and how it would lead to writing the best-selling book One Man’s Wilderness. Sam Keith passed away in 2003. But in 2013, his son-in-law and children’s book author/illustrator Brian Lies discovered in an archive box in their garage a book manuscript, originally written in 1974 after the publication of One Man’s Wilderness. First Wilderness is the story of Keith's own experiences, at times harrowing, funny, and fascinating. Along with the original manuscript are photos and excerpts from his journals, letters, and notebooks, woven in to create a compelling and poignant memoir of search and discovery. Foreword by Nick Jans, one of Alaska's foremost authors and photographers, and Afterword by Keith’s daughter Laurel Lies.

Since publishing the original edition of A Woman's World in 1995, Travelers' Tales has been the recognized leader in women's travel literature. The Best Women's Travel Writing 2010 is the sixth book in an annual series that presents stimulating, inspiring, and uplifting adventures from women who have traveled to the ends of the earth to discover new places, peoples, and facets of themselves. The common threads connecting these stories are a woman's perspective and fresh, compelling storytelling to make the reader laugh, weep, wish she were there, or be glad she wasn't. In The Best Women's Travel Writing 2010 readers will discover the hidden magic of Flamenco in Spain, walk the night and its terrors in Benin, have an excellent last day in Costa Rica, poke their way into the psyche of a security agent in Kabul, learn something new about death and Mexico in San Miguel de Allende, travel the darker side of the Hawaiian fantasy, draw a map of Argentinian tango, meet the best people in the world in Zimbabwe...and much more.

An Inspiration for Anyone Who Wonders If the Time for Adventure Has Passed This is the story of a middle-aged businesswoman who left a successful career to see if she could find something more meaningful to do with her life. A noncyclist, Eloise Hanner joined the first Big Ride (sponsored by the American Lung Association), in which more than seven hundred bicycle riders crossed the country from Seattle to Washington, D.C., in the summer of 1998. To Hanner, the ride represented a new beginning fraught with challenges and opportunities. Starting from zero, she trained for several months to work up to where she could ride and average of more than eighty miles a day. What started as a bicycle odyssey, however, developed into a distilled version of life, where storms became life-threatening and strong friendships formed in days instead of weeks or months. More than a travelogue, Hanner's account of the inaugural Big Ride is an examination of career and values and what to do with the second half of life—a question asked by many baby boomers as they approach fifty.

In Cruise Confidential, Brian David Bruns spills the dirt or in this case, the dirty water on those romantic, fun-filled vacations at sea. His hilarious chronicle of the year he spent working for Carnival Cruise Lines takes readers down into the areas where the crew works and lives, leaving readers gasping with laughter as they're assaulted nonstop with events that range from the absurd to the utterly bizarre. Stewards fighting over food. Cutlery allowances and other nonsensical rules. What the crew calls those onboard (no, it's not "passengers"). And of course, the sex. An abundance of ready, willing, and able bodies eager for action on a vessel replete with nooks and crannies leads to love in some mighty strange, and seemingly impossible, places. Breezy, entertaining, and informative, Cruise Confidential is essential reading for those planning a cruise or for anyone who just needs a good laugh.

"What's the strangest thing you've ever seen or experienced?" Gina and Scott Gaille have traveled to more than 100 countries, including many off-the-beaten-path places in Africa, South America, and Asia. Wherever they go, they ask this question. Everyone has a story, and some are truly extraordinary. Strange Tales of World Travel recounts 50 of these Bizarre, Mysterious, Horrible, Hilarious encounters, including: Daring Diplomat, who ate the flesh of the venomous cobra bird in the Sahara Desert Pearl Trader, who survived a fever through a harrowing "human" honey treatment in Oman Agent Ghost, who was shot and left to die in a garbage dump in Africa Death-Defying Instagrammer, who stepped on the tail of the world's sixth most venomous snake in Australia to take a better photo Human Pet, who became a prince's prisoner in Qatar Imperial CEO, who made a minion fly twelve hours to Paris from Abu Dhabi to buy clean underwear Gorilla Doll, who broke the rules of visiting Rwandan gorillas and got dragged up the side of a volcano Strange Tales of World Travel presents unforgettable stories that celebrate the unique character of countries around the globe-and the distinctive characters that make travel endlessly intriguing and exhilarating.

By the time Benacerraf received a Nobel prize in 1980 for his discovery of immune response genes, he had travelled a long way - literally on the road to success. He was born in Venezuela in 1920 to Sephardic Jewish parents from Algeria and Morocco. Benacerraf's childhood was spent primarily in Paris, until fear of war with Nazi Germany compelled his family to flee to Venezuela in 1939. Persuading his parents to send him to New York that same year, Benacerraf attended Columbia University, beginning a peripatetic existence that lasted until he landed in Boston in 1969, where he has held prominent positions at Harvard Medical School and the Dana Farber Cancer Institute. In the meantime, his passion for medical research gained him numerous prestigious appointments and awards. In addition to chronicling developments in his personal life, Benacerraf offers up rather dry accounts of his most important research projects - as well as his prediction for advances in cancer treatment and his somewhat crotchety opinions on the state of science education today and the research grant business. Despite colourful early years and his impressive accomplishments, Benacerraf paints his life in a two-dimensional fashion and presents insights without enough imagination to sustain the average reader's interest for long.

'Reading Brodsky's essays is like a conversation with an immensely erudite, hugely entertaining and witty (and often very funny) interlocutor' Wall Street Journal Watermark is Joseph Brodsky's witty, intelligent, moving and elegant portrait of Venice. Looking at every aspect of the city, from its waterways, streets and architecture to its food, politics and people, Brodsky captures its magnificence and beauty, and recalls his own memories of the place he called home for many winters, as he remembers friends, lovers and enemies he has encountered. Above all, he reflects with great poetic force on how the rising tide of time affects city and inhabitants alike. Watermark is an unforgettable piece of writing, and a wonderful evocation of a remarkable, unique city. Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature

In the summer of 1958, jazz and blues historian Samuel Charters traveled with Ann Danberg to Andros, a remote island "on the wrong side of the wind" in the Bahamas. Living within a small local community descended from a handful of Bahamian slaves, they discovered how the unique historical fusion of disparate cultures on Andros, from Africa and Europe, had resulted in a wealth of traditional music that had stubbornly resisted the influx of modern styles. Combining rare travel and musical elements with Danberg's evocative photographs, Char-ters describes their search for a song so rich and startling in its resonance, they had to follow it to its source. "Just about the best 'what-I-did-on-my-summer-vacation' report ever written." --"Booklist "(starred review)