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Armchair Travel April 2019
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| In Putin's Footsteps: Searching for the Soul of an Empire Across Russia's Eleven Time... by Nina Khrushcheva and Jeffrey TaylerWhat happened: Two writers traveled across Russia, visiting with locals and pondering how Russia's vastness and history has helped shape its national identity and culture.
Did you know? Russian American author Nina Khrushcheva is the great-granddaughter of former Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev.
For fans of: Lisa Dickey's Bears in the Streets, David Green's Midnight in Siberia, and other looks at lesser-known parts of Russia by astute travelers. |
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Antarctica's Lost Aviator: The Epic Adventure to Explore the Last Frontier on Earth
by Jeff Maynard
Description: By the 1930s, no one had yet crossed Antarctica, and its vast interior remained a mystery frozen in time. Hoping to write his name in the history books, wealthy American Lincoln Ellsworth announced he would fly across the unexplored continent. And to honor his hero, Wyatt Earp, he would carry his gun belt on the flight. The main obstacles to Ellsworth's ambition were numerous: he didn't like the cold, he avoided physical work, and he couldn't navigate. Consequently, he hired the experienced Australian explorer, Sir Hubert Wilkins, to organize the expedition on his behalf. While Ellsworth battled depression and struggled to conceal his homosexuality, Wilkins purchased a ship, hired a crew, and ordered a revolutionary new airplane constructed. The Ellsworth Trans-Antarctic Expeditions became epics of misadventure, as competitors plotted to beat Ellsworth, pilots refused to fly, crews mutinied, and the ship was repeatedly trapped in the ice. Finally, in 1935, Ellsworth took off to fly from the Weddell Sea to the Ross Sea. A few hours after leaving, radio contact with him was lost and the world gave him up for dead.
Why you might like it: Antarctica's Lost Aviator brings alive one of the strangest episodes in polar history, using previously unpublished diaries, correspondence, photographs, and film to reveal the amazing true story of the first crossing of Antarctica and how, against all odds, it was achieved by the unlikeliest of heroes..
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| See You in the Piazza: New Places to Discover in Italy by Frances MayesWhat it is: an evocative, recipe-complemented travelogue through 13 regions of Italy by the bestselling author of Under the Tuscan Sun, who's often joined by her husband and her teenage grandson as she eats sumptuous meals in lovely locales.
Read this next: for more books that detail the good eats and fascinating sights in the off-the-beaten-path parts of Italy, pick up Elizabeth Helman Minchilli's Eating My Way Through Italy (also with recipes) or Matt Goulding's Pasta, Pane, Vino (which includes many color photos). |
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Worlds Elsewhere: Journeys around Shakespeare's Globe
by Andrew Dickson
What it's about: A book about how Shakespeare became fascinated with the world, and how the world became fascinated with Shakespeare. Describes how the works of William Shakespeare went global, from troupes of English actors traveling through Europe in the 1600s performing Hamlet, to Nazi Germany and even Bollywood, where the Bard's works have inspired countless Indian movies.
Why read it: No other writer's work has been performed, translated, adapted, and altered in such a remarkable variety of cultures and languages. Both a cultural history and a literary travelogue, Worlds Elsewhere is an attempt to understand how Shakespeare has become the international phenomenon he is--and why.
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The Victorian and the Romantic: A Memoir, a Love Story, and a Friendship Across Time
by Nell Stevens
What it's about: The author of Bleaker House traces the impossible romance between mid-19th-century Bront biographer Elizabeth Gaskell and much-younger American critic Charles Eliot Norton, exploring how the PhD-candidate author drew literary and personal inspiration from their relationship.
Why read it: The Victorian and the Romantic evokes the bittersweet ache of lost love and the consolations of female writerly ambition.
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Chasing the Last Laugh: Mark Twain's Raucous and Redemptive Round-the-World...
by Richard Zacks
What it is: When aging Mark Twain set out to travel the world in 1895 on what amounts to a comedy tour, he did so because he was broke. Desperately needing money to pay back his many creditors, he performed to English-speaking audiences in the United States, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Africa, and, his favorite stop, India. After the year-long tour was over, he spent an additional four years in Europe. Drawing on newspaper accounts,
Why readit: Twain's own journals and letters, and unpublished materials, historian Richard Zacks presents a fast-paced, humorous, and informative look at Twain's late-life adventures (including how he got into such dire financial straits to begin with).
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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