The Art of Travel

"It’s a thoughtful account of de Botton’s engagement with artists about travel. He focuses on painters and novelists with a view to asking what light they can shed on why we travel, and picking up titbits from them for our own travels. Get the weekly Five Books newsletter One of my favourite examples he discusses is Edward Hopper. Hopper painted places like bus stations, petrol stations, the sorts of in-between places that normally we disregard when we think about travelling. They’re not places we usually think about visiting. We’re thinking about seeing cathedrals or mountains. Hopper is painting all these in-between places that would never occur to us to pay attention to and de Botton asks, why? He asks why they’re good for us and he reflects on the fact that he quite enjoys spending time in motorway cafés, for example, or airport waiting lounges. Honestly no, I can’t. But it makes for a good couple of paragraphs. For him, these are places where it’s okay to be lonely and that’s the appeal of them. He thinks that’s what Hopper captured. That’s one of the ways that he’s looking at artists who have engaged with travel. He’s thinking, ‘What can I take away from this?’ He uses Hopper to explain why he enjoys being in these sorts of in-between places. Paul Theroux has a chapter in his Tao of Travel arguing that although many travel writers appear to travel alone, they don’t—including Bruce Chatwin . His wife doesn’t appear in the books, but apparently there is a long tradition of travel writers doing this: pretending to be travelling alone when in fact they have their partners with them. There’s a lovely quote from Ella Maillart on this. Reflecting on a 3,500 mile trip from Beijing to Kashmir, she writes that she prefers to travel alone because “a companion is in himself a detached ‘piece’ of Europe. When I have a companion by my side, together we build a foreign cell, a ‘resistance’ which can only with difficulty blend into new surroundings”. I think that’s true. I’ve done almost all of my travelling alone and I wouldn’t have it any other way. I think I’ve had more varied experienced as a result. It’s also been harder, which I think has added to the value for me. I also think local people are far more willing to talk to you if you’re alone—they feel sorry for you, and you’re clearly not a threat. I’ve particularly found that, when I’m alone, other women approach me happily. John Ruskin , the painter. Ruskin is all about these incredibly intricate, realistic drawings of nature. He painted many different things but this is what de Botton focuses on. Ruskin, in his view, shows that painting is one way of absorbing your environment, almost of capturing it. One way to think about it today is using mindfulness . If you are looking at something so intently that you are capturing every line and curve, then you are paying mindful attention to it. You have to be focused on that thing. De Botton, again, uses this as a way of saying, ‘this is one of the things we should do when we travel: we should pay attention to the world around us. And then take that back home with us, take these observations home.’ Yes, I agree and it can be invigorating to know how little you know. In our everyday lives we can complacently think, ‘I know lots of things.’ As soon as you’re somewhere unfamiliar you realize, ‘Gosh, I know almost nothing.’ You can’t speak the language. You can’t read the signs. You don’t understand the cultural cues that you’re surrounded by. You don’t know what the birds are, what the plants are. I think that’s useful as an experience for humans to have regularly. Which is amazing. It’s a good feeling to go somewhere and people are pleased that you’ve arrived, that they want you to see their home. The most obvious difference is that de Botton is interested in artists. He’s looking at what novelists and painters can tell us. Every now and then he brings in a philosopher, but the book is focused on novelists and painters, which is very different to what I’m trying to do, with my focus on what philosophers can tell us about travel. So the people we’re looking at is one of the differences. Also, what I’m interested in is telling the story of philosophical engagement with travel since the Age of Discovery, which is when philosophers got interested in travel. It’s not comprehensive, but I’m picking out the biggest episodes throughout that history. That’s not something that de Botton is doing. He’s a brilliant writer, so it’s an extremely easy read. It’s enlightening. It’s not about philosophy, but it’s very good. Incidentally, de Botton’s book shares a title with The Art of Travel by Francis Galton. This book is also entertaining, but for different reasons. It’s got lots of advice for the would-be explorer. Galton was a Victorian explorer and he often travelled with servants because although he was intrepid he was also very rich. So, for example, he warns you that if you are sleepy or deaf, you should never travel without your manservants."