The Lawrence Durrell Travel Reader

Book excerpt: A collection of travel essays from the bestselling author whose writing sparkles with “prose as luminous as the Mediterranean air he loves” (Time). Few men have traveled as wisely as Lawrence Durrell. Born in India, he lived in Corfu as a young man, enjoying salt air, cobalt water, and an unfettered bohemian lifestyle. Over the following decades, he rambled around the Mediterranean, making homes in Egypt, Cyprus, and Greece. Each time he moved, he asked himself why he felt compelled to travel. In this book, he gives his answer. Durrell knew that the wise traveler looks not for pleasure, education, or landmarks, but is hungry for a sense of place—the element of a landscape, city, or nation that makes its people who they are. In this anthology, passages from Durrell’s classic Mediterranean writings are paired with observations on other lands. His writing is poetic, lush, and achingly clear, for this was a man who truly saw the world.