Women Travelers on the Nile: An Anthology of Travel Writing through the Centuries

Middle East Travel Anthologies

by Deborah Manley (Editor), M.L.M. Carey, Eliza Fay

Relentlessly entertaining "―Michelle Green, The New York Times

Women travelers in Egypt in the nineteenth century saw aspects of the country unseen by their male counterparts, as they spent time both in the harems of Cairo and with the women they met along the Nile. Some of them, like Sarah Belzoni and Sophia Poole, spoke Arabic. Others wrote engagingly of their experiences as observers of an exotic culture, with special access to some places no man could ever go. From Eliza Fay’s description of arriving in Egypt in 1779 to Rosemary Mahoney’s daring trip down the Nile in a rowboat in 2006, this lively collection of writing by women travelers includes Lady Evelyn Cobbold, Isabella Bird, Norma Lorimer, Harriet Martineau, Florence Nightingale, Amelia Edwards, and Lucie Duff Gordon.

Genres: Nonfiction, Travel, Egypt, Adventure, History, Middle East

160 pages, Hardcover

Published September 15, 2016

Reviews

[Linniegayl · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a short, interesting read filled with snippets from the diaries of some of the early female travelers in Egypt.

[Hannah · Rating 4 out of 5]

I bought this in Egypt, so it was really cool to go back and read this book and still know what they are talking about. I couldn’t ever forget Egypt and I loved walking down memory lane.

[Cameron Toney · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've always loved Egypt. As a child, ancient Egypt was my favorite thing, and, honestly, I'm still obsessed. I've always wanted to go, and, in 2020, I was supposed to go.
Well.... that's going to have to be rescheduled.
But my family has been flooding me with gifts to help me prepare and imagine my as-yet-unscheduled trip, and this book was one of the best.
This book is a small little charmer, but it's important to have expectations to it. It has no central narrative or framing device, it's just excerpts from the journals of women who had traveled on the Nile. This is exactly my sort of thing, but it might not be yours.
To me, this was the perfect little window into an experience I hope to have!

[Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fascinating little book containing snippets from early 18th to 20th century European women's accounts of their travels in Egypt. Includes, amongst others, Florence Nightingale, Isabella Bird, Harriet Martineau, about 26 in total.
Norma Lorimer describes the dawn at Abu Simbel when it was at it's original site in 1855 and Sarah Belzoni was with her explorer/archaeologist husband, who was sometimes known as The Great Belzoni, when he was the first European to record entering the temple.
Would love to look into all these travellers accounts in more depth.

[Kris · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a wonderful little book with short passages from the journals and writings of 26 intrepid women travelers (even including the famous US nurse, Florence Nightingale) who traveled to Egypt & up & down the Nile from 1779-1914. The passages are all fascinating, & carefully chosen to give the reader a captivating armchair trip, some 100-200+ years ago, to the Cairo, up & down the Nile, Luxor, Abu Simbel & desert environs of yesteryear. Travel was perilous then, & at the very least difficult & time consuming. Sometimes no drinkable water was to be had. Fascinating to read of Karnak Temple when it was half-buried in sand, and people living in a village inside of it! Many of the other monuments, too, were half-buried in sand. Dreamlike to read about visiting Abu Simbel temple (today, overrun with tourists no matter the time of day you visit) alone & by candle-light! Or by the bright light of dawn, which illuminates the otherwise very dark interior. Enjoyed the book beginning to end (which contains short bios of every writer.)

[Pineapple Pizza · Rating 4 out of 5]

Delicious writings. It definitely brings the good old adventure times (or how we imagined them) back to mind. The world wasn't a place to be taken for granted and what we achieve in a few-hour flight was actually a dangerous travel the would take months.
These women made the exception in their time and we're lucky tmfor having retrieved their beautiful and tasteful words about Egypt in the 19th Century.

[Melike · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this small yet rich collection of travel writings during my trip to Egypt, and it added a whole new layer to my experience. Seeing the places I visited through the eyes of 19th century women travelers was truly fascinating, especially the vivid details of everyday life from that era. What moved me most was their genuine effort to understand local women in Egypt and the meaningful connections they formed with them something I found incredibly valuable and inspiring.

[Rana Abo Amra رنـا أبوعمرة · Rating 5 out of 5]

one of the amazing texts i read in my life

[Youssef ElNahas · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting but with little commentary/context of the accounts

[Hager Moharram · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not as great as I expected it to be