"How could I have known then with no maps acquired and my bags not yet packed that my journey had already begun? ...The tools of a traveler are compass and map. They calculate distances covered and destinations sought but cannot measure the consequences of experiences on a human heart," writes Michael Katakis in his introduction.
Traveller is a collection of letters and journal entries that bring the immediacy of experience together with perceptive reflections of the author's own past. The entries in this volume are not travel guides. They are more personal, like letters from the most desirable sort of friend. The friend carries the listener with him as he meanders through the medina in Fez or into the hills of Gallipoli. His voice is such that listeners can almost smell the herbs and dusty soil of Crete, and always they are introduced to the people he meets along the way.
For anyone curious about the world, and introduced with a foreword written and read by Michael Palin, Traveller is sure to delight, infuriate and, perhaps most importantly, inspire thought about the complex world around them.
Download and start listening now!
"This is a beautiful book. The sentiment is there. Wonderful, touching, read."
— Erika (5 out of 5 stars)
“ Reminded me why I started writing in the first place: sheer love of life and the joy of describing it. I feel like throwing away my projects and starting fresh. ”
— Belle Yang Author: Baba: A Return to China on My Father's Shoulders" These "observations" are pure unadulterated narcissism run amok. Someone pass me the Pepto-Bismal. "
— Michael, 6/3/2012Michael Katakis has authored a number of books, including Despatches, The Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial, and, as editor, Sacred Trusts: Essays on Stewardship and Responsibility and Excavating Voices: Listening to Photographs of Native Americans. His writing and photography have been collected by a wide range of institutions, including the National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC, the Victoria and Albert Museum, the British Library in London, and Stanford University’s Special Collections Department. In 1999, Michael was elected Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, and in 2001 he and his wife’s exhibition, A Time and Place Before War, opened at the Geographical Society in London. The British Library acquired Michael’s photographic work for their collection in 2008. The library is now the repository for his entire body of work. He lives in France and the United States with his wife, anthropologist Kris Hardin.