The Art of Travel

by Alain de Botton

If our lives are dominated by a search for happiness, then perhaps few activities reveal as much about the dynamics of this quest – in all its ardour and paradoxes – than our travels. They express, however inarticulately, an understanding of what life might be about, outside the constraints of work and the struggle for survival.

Loneliness is the dominant theme. Hopper’s figures seem far from home; they sit or stand alone, looking at a letter on the edge of a hotel bed or drinking in a bar,

Journeys are the midwives of thought. Few places are more conducive to internal conversations than a moving plane, ship or train.

Sublime places repeat in grand terms a lesson that ordinary life typically teaches viciously: that the universe is mightier than we are, that we are frail and temporary and have no alternative but to accept limitations on our will;