A moving account of friendship and discovery on the island of Sicily from the acclaimed travel writer and bestselling author of The Alexandria Quartet. Despite decades spent writing poetic evocations of the timeless pleasures of life in the Mediterranean, Lawrence Durrell had never set foot on the sea’s largest island: mysterious, impenetrable Sicily. For years his friend Martine begged him to visit her on this sun-kissed paradise, and though he always intended to, life inevitably interfered. It took Martine’s sudden death to finally bring him to the island’s shores. With Martine’s letters in his pocket, Durrell signs up for a tour group, hoping to learn the travel habits of those who aren’t obsessively devoted to island life. As he treks from sight to sight, dizzy with history and culture, Durrell finds echoes of his past lives in Rhodes, Cyprus, and Corfu.

The Sicilian Defence is the most widely played chess opening, both at club level as well as among top grandmasters. Since Black gets dynamic play in almost all variations, black players of all levels will probably continue to play the Sicilian for a long time to come. It has been difficult for White to obtain any advantage in Sicilian sidelines, and this book therefore presents a complete repertoire for White in the most widely played main lines: the Open Sicilians with 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3. All of Black’s possible answers are covered. ‘Dismantling the Sicilian’ is clearly organized, and each variation is presented with its history, its main ideas, its typical tactics and strategies, and with instructive games. The authors thoroughly explain the relevant themes and always summarizes the most important features. This a completely new edition, updated and extended from the original 2009 publication.

Beautiful and seductive, the Italian island of Sicily offers everything from Greek and Roman temples to mouthwatering street food and a dramatic scenery topped by mighty Mount Etna. Explore Sicily is part of a brand-new series and is the perfect pocket companion for your trip: a full-colour guide containing 14 easy-to-follow routes, taking in all of the classic sights, such as Val di Noto's sublime Baroque architecture and the frenetic capital Palermo, alongside Agrigento's fine Greek temples and, further afield, the stunningly beautiful Aeolian Islands, popular for volcano-climbing. Insight's trademark cultural coverage perfectly sets the routes in context, with introductions to Sicily's cuisine and shopping possibilities, as well as an overview of the island's complex history and the low-down on its array of outdoor activities. Hand-picked places to eat and drink are highlighted in each tour and in the directory section, which contains a wealth of useful practical information including a language guide, as well as a range of carefully selected hotels to suit all budgets. All routes are plotted on the useful pull-out map, and the stunning photography captures the dramatic Sicilian landscape.

In the book there is a selection of texts about Sicily written by british writers such as Shakespeare, Milton, Lawrence, Durrel....The reader will be trasported to this secret land and will discover the poetic meaning of this mysterious island than only poets can explain.

Containing more than 600 entries, this valuable resource presents all aspects of travel writing. There are entries on places and routes (Afghanistan, Black Sea, Egypt, Gobi Desert, Hawaii, Himalayas, Italy, Northwest Passage, Samarkand, Silk Route, Timbuktu), writers (Isabella Bird, Ibn Battuta, Bruce Chatwin, Gustave Flaubert, Mary Kingsley, Walter Ralegh, Wilfrid Thesiger), methods of transport and types of journey (balloon, camel, grand tour, hunting and big game expeditions, pilgrimage, space travel and exploration), genres (buccaneer narratives, guidebooks, New World chronicles, postcards), companies and societies (East India Company, Royal Geographical Society, Society of Dilettanti), and issues and themes (censorship, exile, orientalism, and tourism). For a full list of entries and contributors, a generous selection of sample entries, and more, visit the Literature of Travel and Exploration: An Encyclopedia website.

A selection of the best in travel writing, with both fiction and non-fiction presented together, this companion is for all those who like travelling, like to think about travelling, and who take an interest in their destination. It covers guidebooks as well as books about food, history, art and architecture, religion, outdoor activities, illustrated books, autobiographies, biographies and fiction and lists books both in and out of print. Anderson's Travel Companion is arranged first by continent, then alphabetically by country and then by subject, cross-referenced where necessary. There is a separate section for guidebooks and comprehensive indexes. Sarah Anderson founded the Travel Bookshop in 1979 and is also a journalist and writer on travel subjects. She is known by well-known travel writers such as Michael Palin and Colin Thubron. Michael Palin chose her bookshop as his favourite shop and Colin Thubron and Geoffrey Moorhouse, among others, made suggestions for titles to include in the Travel Companion.

A guide to the fascinating and diverse history and culture of Sicily. The book includes key events, places and artists highlighted in wide-ranging articles presented in four parts: History, Cities, Ancient Sites and Artists. A rich tapestry emerges of an island that has experienced dramatic changes of fortune while becoming a melting-pot of cultural influences from the eastern Mediterranean, North Africa and mainland Italy. It also includes commentary on the monuments and works of art to be seen today, linking Sicily past and present. Follow the stories of Dionysius' castle, the foundation of the cathedral at Monreale, the Sicilian poets who invented the sonnet and the British merchants who made Marsala wine an international brand. Tour the big cities of Catania and Messina, the resorts of Taormina and Cefalù, and the baroque hilltowns of south-eastern Sicily. Explore the ancient sites, among them Segesta, Selinunte and Agrigento. Witness the originality of the island's culture through the profiles of eight artists, sculptors and architects from the Renaissance to the twentieth century including Antonello da Messina, Giacomo Serpotta and Renato Guttuso, as well as Caravaggio, who left some of his last masterpieces on the island. This book complements the author's previous work on Syracuse and Palermo, filling in gaps in the island's story, to form a comprehensive trilogy on Sicily.

730 million people—almost 10% of the world’s population—inhabit islands. One quarter of the states represented at the United Nations are islands. Islands constitute almost twenty percent of the total land area of Greece, and exhibit more significant aspects of biodiversity than other global contexts. They are both occasions of triumph and occurrences of catastrophe. Islands are both open and enclosed communities, points of arrival and departure. Islands exert a fascination for the visitor and generate, in the islander, both positive and negative mindsets. The romantic fallacies about self-sufficiency and insularity of islands are constantly challenged. This collection of essays by scholars from some of the world’s most compelling islands—Jersey, Ireland, Tasmania, Corfu, Ereikousa, Prince Edward Island, Malta—explores the psychology of islands, islanders and their visitors, the literatures they stimulate, and the scientific, ethical and biogeographical issues they present in an increasingly globalised world. Corfu, the home of Lawrence and Gerald Durrell in the 1930s, and host to literary and scientific enquiry, is the place where this collection was conceived, and occupies a central place in its discussions.

Travel writing “as luminous as the Mediterranean air” from the acclaimed author of the Alexandria Quartet, who is featured in PBS’s The Durrells in Corfu (Time). Born in India, acclaimed British novelist and poet Lawrence Durrell lived in Corfu as a young man, enjoying salt air, cobalt water, and an unfettered bohemian lifestyle, along with his brother, Gerald, who would also go on to be a writer and a naturalist. Their real-life family is portrayed in the PBS Masterpiece production, The Durrells in Corfu. Over the following decades, he rambled around the Mediterranean, making homes in Egypt, Cyprus, and Greece, always bringing his poet’s eye to document his experiences. Blue Thirst: In the first of a pair of lectures, given during a 1970s visit to California, Durrell recalls his family’s time living on the Greek island of Corfu, expanding on his eloquent memoir, Prospero’s Cell. When the Second World War came to the Mediterranean, Durrell was swept into diplomatic service, an adventure he vividly recounts in his powerful second lecture. “[Durrell’s] travel books arrive like long letters from a civilized and very funny friend.” —Time Sicilian Carousel: For years, Durrell’s friend Martine had begged him to visit her on the sun-kissed paradise of Sicily, but it took her sudden death to finally bring him to the island’s shores. With Martine’s letters in his pocket, Durrell treks from sight to sight, dizzy with history and culture, and finds haunting echoes of his past lives in Rhodes, Cyprus, and Corfu. “Elegant . . . wonderful.” —Time Bitter Lemons of Cyprus: Against the backdrop of the push for independence on Cyprus in the early 1950s, the poet, novelist, and former British government official buys a house, secures a job, and settles in, yearning for a return to the island lifestyle of his youth. Winner of the Duff Cooper Prize, this memoir is an elegant picture of island life in a changing world. “Brilliant depth of language . . . gathering slowly from the lighter delightful pages to its lost and questioning end. Never for a moment does [Durrell] lose the poet’s touch.” —The New York Times