Collecting Vintage Travel books

 

When I heard that  a  young American writer  had published  a book about  traveling  to Europe based on a battered  1963 copy of Frommer’s  “Europe on $5 a day “,  I figured it was time to take a  look  at the shelves of   vintage  guidebooks and travel literature   I have collected over  the past   50 years.   

For  travel writers and historians, there is nothing as  interesting as  old guides and travel  books.   Here are  some  of the gems in my collection. Most were   paid  only a few dollars  ( or lire, or euro) but   their values today may  range up to  several hundred dollars.

signed by author Lina Waterfield, (Duff Gordon)   1914

One of the  most intriguing  is this one, by the same  author  who wrote  “To Catch a Thief”.  The guide published  in  1953 contains such gems as “a banquet for four can be had for $2.67 in Spain”  and “a bicyclist can tour Europe  on $1.40 a day”.

 It was a clever way to  encourage  Americans  to travel abroad  just as  the Marshall  Plan  was helping  Europe get back on its   feet.

For the beginning collector, there are many  opportunities  to pick up  bargains  in the  strangest places, especially when travelling.  

Older  books in English  are generally  less valued in non-English speaking countries.

I picked up  this  1951 travelogue   in its original dust wrapper   at an open air  stall  in  Naples for  10 euro. A Canadian book seller  lists the same book, without dust wrapper, at 128 euro!   

from  UK dealer Peter M. Daly for 17£

Thanks to the Gutenberg  project  many vintage  guides  can be downloaded for free and read on  your iPad or Kindle device. 

 An example is a travelogue by  Edward Wigran  “Northern Spain”  (1906),  full of  interesting  facts about Asturian villages  with colorful  illustrations.   

  A copy of the original will put you back   $195,  if you can find it. 

To discover  the value of your vintage  guides and travel books, make a search on  the  websites such as  abebooks, alibris, biblio and addall.

Other sources  for  finding old and vintage travel books and guides  are  these websites: oldguidebooks,  manybooks.net. as well as the thousands of  Italian  booksellers who  list  on the mega site  maremagnum.   

The study of travel literature, Hodoeporics,  is  fast becoming  a specialized branch of Italian language and  literature studies. 

Check out   the website  of  the   CIRVI, Centro Interuniversitario di Ricerche sul Viaggio in Italia which is   based  in Moncalieri , near Torino for more information about  travel  writing  and literature .

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