What makes travel literature and its myriad subgenres so enduring, so engaging is — quite simply — the ways in which all the best examples allow readers to vicariously experience the exact same places and faces as authors who lived them. Sometimes, globetrotting provides far more of an education than ticking away hours in a classroom. But not everyone possesses the time, finances or resources to soak up the world’s millions of wonders, and until they do, travel literature will always boast relevance. Even beyond that, depictions of politics, cultures, religions, economics, geographies and everything else involved in creating a region for good or for ill provide great insight to those studying these fields. Far more than 20 incredibly worthwhile reads exist within this genre, of course. So please consider this diverse sample of amazing examples as a starting point rather than a definitive listing.
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Seyahatname by Evliya Celebi: This Ottoman traveler published a staggering 10 volumes chronicling his myriad eclectic journeys across Eurasia and Africa from 1630 to 1672. Despite his tendency to exaggerate and occasionally fictionalize real historical events, scholars still consider Evliya Celebi’s work a significant look at Turkic (and other!) cultures and geography in the 17th Century. Seyahatname is actually a literary genre as opposed to a title, referring to the writings of Islamic travelers around the Middle Ages; most believe Evliya Celebi continuously stands as the greatest example.
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