Okay this one killed me. It was just so incredibly charming. It is the real letters of a young German who visited England in 1782. And et me tell you, he is LOVING it. Sample this from the day of his arrival:
“How different did I find these living hedges, the green of them and of the trees – this whole paradisical region – from ours and all others I have seen! How incomparable the roads! How firm the pathway beneath me!”
It rejoices in chapter headings like “Richmond: A Perfect Town.” He finds the street lighting amazing; though apparently this wasn’t just him – a German prince who was there shortly before found it so unusual that he assumed they had illuminated the town just for him.
Weirdly I just read another book by a young man who went on a long walk – Laurie Lee’s WHEN I WALKED OUT ONE MIDSUMMER MORNING, and it has just the same vibe. While I was impressed that Laurie Lee could relax just by looking at the view (no podcast, nothing), I was even more impressed by Moritz who relaxes by reading Milton. What could make you chill out like PARADISE LOST?
It was a deeply charming window into 18th century London. For example, apparently it took so long to get from the mouth of the Thames to London that most travellers got off at the coast and took a carriage. The river was so busy that you always knew where it was because of the forest of masts.
But to be honest the appeal was not so much the historic fact, as it was the joy and enthusiasm of this young man, dead these two hundred years.