Any Baedeker will tell us "where we ought to travel, but only Alain de Botton will tell us "how and "why. With the same intelligence and insouciant charm he brought to How Proust Can Save Your Life," de Botton considers the pleasures of anticipation; the allure of the exotic, and the value of noticing everything from a seascape in Barbados to the takeoffs at Heathrow.
Even as de Botton takes the reader along on his own peregrinations, he also cites such distinguished fellow-travelers as B...