Wanderlust - A History of Walking

'Radical, humane, witty' Alain de Botton
'Magisterial' Will Self, Guardian

Explore historical, political and philosophical paths traced by walkers in this profound and diverting modern classic.


What does it mean to be out walking in the world, whether in a landscape or a metropolis, on a pilgrimage or a protest march? In this first general history of walking, Rebecca Solnit draws together numerous stories to create a new way of looking at one of humanity's most fundamental and expressive acts.

Arguing that walking as history means walking for pleasure and for political, aesthetic, and social meaning, Solnit homes in on the walkers whose everyday and extreme acts have shaped our culture, from the philosophers of ancient Greece to the poets of the Romantic Age, from the perambulations of the Surrealists to the ascents of mountaineers.

With profiles of some of the most significant walkers in history and fiction - from Wordsworth to Gary Snyder, from Rousseau to Argentina's Mother of the Plaza de Mayo, from Jane Austen's Elizabeth Bennet to Andre Breton's Nadja - Wanderlust takes us on an unforgettable journey and shows how walking can affect the body, the imagination, and the world around us.

'One of those rare, quirky, rather lovable books that makes you look anew at something so familiar ... Solnit winningly traces the shifting cultural significance of putting one foot in front of another' Daily Telegraph