rebecca solnit wanderlust a history of walking

William Wordsworth and his epigones turn their treks into poetry, both capturing and shaping a natural romantic zeitgeist. In the 19th century, an unprecedented passion for walking ensues. When siblings William and Dorothy Wordsworth embark on a four-day trek in the Pennines and Lake District in the winter of 1799, it is a modest act that would be the start of a revolution in how western men and women view and experience nature. Here, the parks of the aristocracy spread out to become ingeniously designed landscapes for strolling through, mimicking the wild nature but with a clear border to separate it from the disorderly and uncivilized world outside the walls. An obvious starting point is late 18th century England. Having said that, it’s an inspiring pleasure to join Solnit. Solnit, of course, also walks physically and we follow her on a pilgrimage to Chimayó in New Mexico, to demonstrate against nuclear weapons-tests in the Nevada desert, along Manhattan avenues and in the footsteps of legendary mountain hiker John Muir in the Sierra Nevada mountains.Ī general criticism of Wanderlust is the consistent Anglo-Saxon perspective, which excludes a world of hiking.

The text itself becomes a winding journey of discovery at a leisurely pace, with detours along alluring paths that suddenly appear, and with stops to get an overview of the intellectual landscape. Instead, she is interested in walking for other purposes and takes the reader on an educational journey through the history of ideas from – roughly – the Enlightenment to the present day.

This is still the case for a large part of the world’s population.īut it is not the pure function of getting from point A to point B that occupies Rebecca Solnit in her classic study Wanderlust. In the absolute dominant part of human history, wandering has been done out of necessity, because it has been the only means of transportation available.

Rebecca solnit wanderlust a history of walking