Art Of Travel

The Art of Travel is Alain de Bottons travel guide with a difference. Few activities seem to promise us as much happiness as going travelling: taking off for somewhere else somewhere far from home a place with more interesting weather customs and landscapes. But although we are inundated with advice on where to travel to we seldom ask why we go and how we might become more fulfilled by doing so. With the help of a selection of writers artists and thinkers - including Flaubert Edward Hopper Wordsworth and Van Gogh - Alain de Bottons bestselling The Art of Travel provides invaluable insights into everything from holiday romance to hotel mini-bars airports to sight-seeing. The perfect antidote to those guides that tell us what to do when we get there The Art of Travel tries to explain why we really went in the first place - and helpfully suggests how we might be happier on our journeys. Richly evocative sharp and funny. De Botton proves himself to be a very fine travel writer indeed Sunday Telegraph Delightful profound entertaining I doubt if de Botton has written a dull sentence in his life Jan Morris An elegant and subtle work unlike any other. Beguiling Colin Thubron The Times Review “A jewel of civility wit and insight; de Botton has produced wondrous essays. An invitation to hyperbole . . . a volume to give one an expansive sense of wonder.”-The Baltimore Sun“Illuminating. . .a lovely combination of enthusiasm sensitivity a care for the large and small and the local and the foreign. . . reading de Botton’s book will help a person discover something fabulous in everyday.-Chicago Tribune“There is something Proustian inThe Art of Travel in the best sense for Mr. de Botton is a kind offlaneur strolling through his subject thoughtfully and offering nuanced truths based on his reading experience and philosophical temperament.”-The Wall Street Journal“It would be difficult to name a writer as erudite and yet as reader friendly. . .With a wry self-deprecating charm he passes his enthusiasms along in such manner that you can’t help being delighted by them.”- The Seattle Times“[R]efreshing and profoundly readable. . . . Thanks to de Botton’s detailed and thoughtful writing coupled with his clever curiosityThe Art of Travel has the potential to enrich not only our journeys but also our lives.” -The Philadelphia Inquirer “[De Botton] relates even the most disappointing experiences with delightful wit graceful prose and surprising insight..” -The Los Angeles Times “Wickedly funny . . . De Botton travels like the rest of us but he brings with him the amazing erudition crisp lovely prose and entertaining intellect that madeHow Proust Can Change Your Life andThe Consolations of Philosophy such phenomenal successes.” -The Boston Globe “[E]xudes erudition and artfulness. . . . Delightful.” -Minneapolis Star-Tribune “[A] wonderful book: inventive witty intelligent and beautifully written. At its best its prose achieves the intensity of aphorism . . . provocative and insightful . . . teeming with tantalizing detail.” -The Boston Phoenix “Charmingly and capably convinces us how unaware most of us are as we move about in the world . . . will leave the reader mentally reaching for a pencil to check off the graceful witty turns of Mr. de Botton’s mind.” -The Washington Times “A thoughtful and anecdote-rich meditation on how trips can alter us in unexpected ways.” -Elle Magazine “An erudite funny brand of philosophy . . . will make you think and laugh and want to plan a trip to test out some of de Botton’s ideas for yourself.” -Atlanta Journal-Constitution “[A] quirky delightful meditation on why we go where we go . . . What makes his book so much fun and so utterly unique is the way his mind works as he contemplates his (and our) responses to museums airports landscapes hotels-even to a gas station. Read just a few pages of