Wow, a Philip K. Dick fan. That guy's pretty wild. Highly collectable, isn't he?
My big weakness is early travel and exploration. I don't have any Champlain or Captain Cook, but maybe someday. I've got a 2 volume set called Travels of the Jesuits from 1762. The second volume covers their travels into Canada. It's interesting to read these guys because they were meticulous note takers and they were often the first Europeans to encounter indigenous people. Their descriptions of the native people are valuable because they hadn't been influenced by the Europeans yet and were still "pure."
I have several things on the exploration of the West. No Lewis and Clark, but minor league versions of them. One from 1823 is the account of an expedition to the Rocky Mountains. Another is from 1820 and chronicles travels all over the interior of the country. These money books have wonderful maps and are considered "important", but one of my favorites is one from 1717 that is not considered important and wasn't expensive but is about as close to time travel as you get. It's an account written by an englishwoman about her travels in Spain. Her name isn't used but it's titled "Ingenious and Diverting Letters of a Lady's Travels into Spain Describing the Devotions, Nunneries, Humour, Customs, Laws, Militia, Trade, Diet, and Recreations of the People. Intermixed with Great Variety of Modern Adventures, and Surprising Accidents: Being the Truest and Best Remarks extant, on the Court and Country." It's written in a readable style, not dry like those surveyors and engineers who wrote about much of the American exploration.
We have a lot of other odds and ends that we've accumulated. My wife has a beautiful purple leather bound volume with gilt lettering and gilt top of a Lord Byron from 1820. That one may be the most handsome book on the shelf. |
