Restless Women Travelers: Q&A with Lavinia Spalding

Over the past few weeks, we've been excited to introduce you to some of the most compelling travel writing by women. This is the summer of Restless Women Travelers, and we hope that we have inspired you to go forth and adventure, or to at least to soak up the journeys of these fearless voyagers. 

But just in case you haven't yet been hooked on the series, we got Lavinia Spalding, acclaimed travel writer and introducer of our new edition of Edith Wharton's A Motor-Flight Through France, to share with us her fascination with the book, her advice for visiting France, and her biggest inspirations as a writer and traveler.

RB: What will readers be surprised and delighted by in Edith Wharton's A Motor-Flight Through France? 

I think what’s most surprising is how encyclopedic Wharton's knowledge was about French history and architecture. It would be tricky to compare A Motor-Flight Through France to any of today's travel memoirs—it isn't filled with the usual odes to meals or poignant interactions with locals; she doesn’t infuse the narrative with a lot of personal anecdotes. It’s really a long love letter to the country’s cathedrals and culture, small towns and byways. What’s most delightful are the gorgeous, evocative descriptions of place—both close-up and panoramic—and the rare view of this part of the world during a bygone era when cars were brand-new and travel wasn’t something anyone took for granted. 

What should a first-time visitor to France be sure to do—and be sure not to do? 

My standard advice for a first-time visitor to any place is to get lost on your very first day, when your sense of wonder is still peaking. In Paris (or any city in France for that matter), just wander. Make a sport out of seeing and smelling and touching and tasting absolutely everything. If you’re driving through the countryside, stop in every small town to sample the local olive oil and wine and cheese and bread. There’s really no limit to what you should do in France, and I think the only thing I’d tell you not to do is be afraid of speaking the language. There’s a misconception about the French, that they’re intolerant of hearing their language butchered, but I massacre that lovely language every time I open my mouth to speak it, and I’ve never experienced anything but warmth and graciousness as a result. 

Who is your greatest travel-writing hero? If you could take a journey together, where would it be? 

I have too many to name just one—and Edith Wharton is certainly in my pantheon of heroes—but I’d definitely want to visit France with MFK Fisher. And yes, I’d be in it mainly for the eating and drinking. But also for the stories—I’ve always admired how Fisher could tease out the kookiest stories from every character she encountered. I’ve also always loved Beryl Markham—her 1940s memoir West with the Night was one of the first travelogues I ever read, and it made a deep impression on me. Markham was the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic from east to west, and she was also one of the first bush pilots. Flying around Africa with her, admiring the animals below, would have been an extraordinary adventure. Finally, if I get to pick a contemporary, it would be Alexandra Fuller, because I know I’d never stop laughing. In addition to being a truly brilliant writer with a breathtaking talent for capturing both place and people, she’s one of the most hilarious human beings alive. 

Launch event at Edith Wharton's The Mount:

On Sunday, June 22, we'll be hosting a very special book launch for the first title in our series, Edith Wharton's A Motor-Flight Through France. The event will take place at The Mount—Edith Wharton's gorgeous home in the Berkshires. Beginning at 5:30, we'll have a short reading by Lavinia Spalding, conversation, and cocktails on the patio overlooking Wharton's gardens, with fellow readers, writers, and travelers. We hope to see you there!

**Book club mavens and travel aficionados: Be sure to join the international conversation about Kira Salak's Four Corners with the Go Girl Travel Network, which has selected the book for their first #GoGirlReads travel book club!

Restless Women Travelers: Juanita Harrison (rebel, globetrotter, mystery)

We're thrilled that Kira Salak's Four Corners is the first Travel Book Club selection by Go Girl Travel, an international network of thousands of women travelers in more than 100 countries. If you like our blog series on intrepid women travelers, we think you'll love #GoGirlReads! Read the book and join the discussion on Twitter or at your local meetup group.

This week in our series on women travel writers, we feature Juanita Harrison’s My Great, Wide, Beautiful World.

Without a doubt, Juanita Harrison stands out from the upper-class white women of her day, who were most often the ones who could afford traveling for pleasure. Not much is known about Harrison's life outside of this book. She was an African American woman born in Mississippi in 1890 and presumably grew up very poor. Still, equipped with an insatiable curiosity for other cultures and languages, she managed to fund and realize a nearly decade-long journey around the world, from America to Europe to Asia, and find employment and independence at every stop along the way. My Great, Wide, Beautiful World concludes with Harrison living in a small grass hut in Waikiki, and we have no way of knowing what happened to her after that. No visual record of her life exists.

A self-taught woman, Harrison's book is written in idiosyncratic prose riddled with misuses of grammar and spelling. Yet her passion for writing and sharing her experiences—from the food she eats to the people she encounters—as she makes her way across more than 20 countries, radiates through the book. Juanita Harrison earned the respect of most everyone she met on her journey, and she unquestionably earns our respect as readers. Here is an excerpt from this truly unique autobiography:

Mar, 6th.

I had a thrilling day at Monte Carlo. The Laws are different from Nice. In Nice I went several times to play a few Franc in the Casino and on the Ball room floor Dark colord girls in their evening cloths dancing in the Arms of Hansom White Frenchmen. The French are great Love makers being man proof I get a big kick out of them. I even sneeked into the gaming room without paying the entrance fee. But at Monte-C. I found it harder. I had on a little French cap and they thought I had slipped away from the family to gamble. Also you must prove you have money. I couldnt prove that, they said they would let me go in just once to stay only one hour. I ask what if I stay longer he said he may put me in jail. I told him I heard it was a nice jail and I would be glad to see it. Then I laied them all out and they gave me a ticket to quick. I knew I would get in. I just wanted to Know what they would say. I wanted to try the table where they played with the II cards. One of the Guards tryed to tell me. But he looked so big and hansom I didnt remember a word he said. So I lost 20 franc. It was worth it.

In our Restless Women Travelers series, we  will celebrate and (re)introduce you to some of the most important travelogues written by women, from Frances Trollope’s colonial voyage to the contemporary jungle treks of Kira Salak. Make sure to look through ourlist of upcoming titles to find the travel tale that will inspire you to be restless this summer!

Launch event at Edith Wharton's The Mount:

On Sunday, June 22, we'll be hosting a very special book launch for the first title in our series, Edith Wharton's A Motor-Flight Through France. The event will take place at The Mount—Edith Wharton's gorgeous home in the Berkshires. Beginning at 5:30, we'll have a short reading, conversation, and cocktails on the patio overlooking Wharton's gardens, with fellow readers, writers, and travelers. We hope to see you there!

For New York City travelers: Restless is partnering with Lit Crawl NYC to provide round-trip shuttle service to the mount. Click the button below for more info. 

Restless Women Travelers: Santha Rama Rau (novelist, memoirist, adventuress)

This week in our series on women travel writers, we feature Santha Rama Rau’s Home to India.

Santha Rama Rau, known for her travel writing and particularly for the acclaimed This Is India, was born in Madras, India in 1923, and educated in England and the United States. After graduating from Wellesley College in 1944, she published her first travel memoir, Home to India. In it, she recounted a trip back to India at the age of 16, after years of living in England where her father was stationed. Santha Rama Rau was not a tourist or an adventurer exploring new territory; she was returning to her roots, and rediscovering her home country and her heritage through the lens of her Western education. While she did eventually make intrepid journeys through Africa and the former Soviet Union among others, Home to India is perhaps her most youthful, passionate, and deeply personal travelogue.

The influence of Santha’s family, and especially of the female role models in her life, is just as compelling as the influence of the Indian landscape. The book opens with her grandmother surprising her when, upon seeing her for the first time in ten years, she discussed her prospects of finding a husband in India. In stark contrast to her grandmother trying to instill “something of the traditional Hindu girl’s attitude to the household,” Santha’s mother was an ardent advocate of women’s reproductive rights and a founder of the international Planned Parenthood Federation. Here is an excerpt that perfectly captures both Santha Rama Rau’s still developing dexterity in observing and writing about culture, and the personal significance of her first voyage back to India:

That evening I decided to draw my grandmother out on politics. I asked her Andy’s question—whether India could be regarded as a country.

“Is India a country in the sense with which we are familiar?” she repeated. “Well, your English friends would tell you that it is only so in the sense that all Indians walk the same earth and watch the same stars.”

She continued thoughtfully, “Your mother tells me that you are not staying with us long, that you will travel over India very far.”

“Yes, I think we’re leaving for Delhi fairly soon to visit Shivan and Kitty.”

“Wherever you go people will tell you about the differences and confusions of India—our disunity and our divergence. But don’t forget that we have humanity in common and we need ask no further than that. We are all people, and among people unity is possible.”

I looked at her solemnly, eager to understand India. Perhaps I seemed a little ridiculous to her, for she said, “You young people are always romantic and scornful and somehow cynical. You are never realistic. When you travel across this country, keep it in your mind that Indians eat and sleep and work like other people. Indians, too, are selfish and generous and, at times, inspired.” She twinkled at me and the crow’s feet round her shiny black eyes contracted with amusement. “And try to remember that the world does not rotate about a point on its circumference.”

I left my grandmother feeling a great affection for her as a person. Although I was antagonistic to her way of life, I had a real desire to find out what kind of a country and culture produced such diverse standards as those of Grandmother’s, Mother’s and mine.

In our Restless Women Travelers series, we  will celebrate and (re)introduce you to some of the most important travelogues written by women, from Frances Trollope’s colonial voyage to the contemporary jungle treks of Kira Salak. Make sure to look through our list of upcoming titles to find the travel tale that will inspire you to be restless this summer!

Launch event:

On Sunday, June 22, we'll be hosting a very special book launch for the first title in our series, Edith Wharton's A Motor-Flight Through France. The event will take place at The Mount—Edith Wharton's gorgeous home in the Berkshires. Beginning at 5:30, we'll have a short reading, conversation, and cocktails on the patio overlooking Wharton's gardens, with fellow readers, writers, and travelers. We hope to see you there!