I love to travel, and the last almost two years have made it tough to scratch that itch. When I really sit back and think about it though, one of the best parts about travel is the anticipation. Before I leave I try to watch movies or read books set in there, to really get a feel for the place.
Literary Places is a short, beautifully illustrated and vividly described tour through 25 cities that feature prominently in different famous literary works: southern India through The God of Small Things, Paris through Les Miserables, New York City through The Catcher in the Rye. Baxter really gets to the essence of actually being in each of these places: you can feel the hot sun on your back in Florence, the heavy, humid air filling your lungs before a storm breaks in Kerala, the briny sea-scented air of cannery row.
The Goodreads reviews that skew negative seemed to expect that this slim guide would have more specific and traditional guidebook info- it does not (and it seems unrealistic to expect that a ‘literary guide’ on 25 places would have much in the way of traditional guidebook content). Rather than thinking about it in that light, I would read this in the purpose that I think its intended: an inspiration for future travel (or even just future armchair travel, as I watch film or tv adaptions of all of these books).
I really appreciated that Baxter included some places and novels that I’d never heard of (Burgher’s Daughter set in Soweto, Berlin Alexanderplatz set in – you guessed it, Berlin- and Palace Walk set in Cairo). I also appreciated being reminded of all of the places that I read about so long ago and want to revisit- the moors of Wuthering Heights, the Bath of almost any Jane Austin novel, the New York of Catcher in the Rye. Take me back! Counting this as my Travel square for cbr13bingo.