Bookish Places #TopTenTuesday
This week’s Top Ten Tuesday topic at That Artsy Reader Girl is “Bookish Places I’ve Visited.” We’re invited to share “neat libraries, book stores, places featured in books, places inspired by books, author homes/places they’ve stayed, etc. You can also share your bucket list of the bookish places you’d like to visit someday.”
Some of my favorite memories are when I read a book while visiting the place that is featured in that book. I’m going to share five of those memories and five book-and-place combinations that I hope to experience someday.
Travel Memories
Ireland. When I visited Ireland, a fellow traveler gave me her battered paperback of Ireland Awakening by Edward Rutherfurd. I connected with events along the River Boyne and in various places in Dublin that we visited.
Paris. I brought two books with me to read during a trip to France and enjoyed experiencing them at the same time as I was seeing the sites:
- Paris by Edward Rutherfurd
- Death in the City of Light by David King
Bletchley Park. One of the books that I brought to England was Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson. It’s a very large book but, somehow, I was lucky enough to visit Bletchley Park on the same day that a main character did. I remember startling myself on the train ride between Birmingham and Bletchley as I realized the coincidence.
Havana. On our fourth foreign trip in four years, I read Our Man in Havana by Graham Greene, while visiting Havana, Cuba. That wasn’t the most informative book that I read about Cuba, but it was the funniest.
Travel Fantasies
Mississippi River Cruise. I want to read Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain while taking a river cruise from Minnesota to New Orleans. I read two other books last summer that would also be perfect: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain and James by Percival Everett.
A view of the Mississippi River from my hometown of Louisiana, MO. I would love to pass my town on a Mississippi River cruise.
New York. Since I’ve read quite a few Edward Rutherfurd books, now, I would love to have the experience of reading New York while visiting the city to visit lots of museums and see a couple of shows.
Trieste, Italy. Rainer Maria Rilke stayed as a guest at Duino Castle and wrote some of his most famous poems there. There’s a scenic hiking trail named after him: Rilke Trail.
Cape Cod. For another literature-related walk, I’m inspired by this post by Joe Kinsella to follow in Henry David Thoreau’s footsteps, tracing the 28-mile shore walk that inspired his collection of essays called Cape Cod.
Concord, Massachusetts. I’ve read Little Women by Louisa May Alcott multiple times, but I would read it again if I could do it on the same day as I visited Orchard House. While I’m in the area, maybe I could manage to read more Thoreau and some Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Me reading my mother’s copy of Little Women