History Of Travel Literature

Early examples of travel literature include Pausanias' Description of Greece in the 2nd century CE, and the travelogues of Ibn Jubayr (1145–1214) and Ibn Batutta (1304–1377), both of whom recorded their travels across the known world in detail. The travel genre was a fairly common genre in medieval Arabic literature.
One of the earliest known records of taking pleasure in travel, of travelling for the sake of travel and writing about it, is Petrarch's (1304–1374) ascent of Mount Ventoux in 1336. He states that he went to the mountaintop for the pleasure of seeing the top of the famous height. His companions who stayed at the bottom he called frigida incuriositas ("a cold lack of curiosity"). He then wrote about his climb, making allegorical comparisons between climbing the mountain and his own moral progress in life.
Michault Taillevent, a poet for the Duke of Burgundy, travelled through the Jura Mountains in 1430 and left us with his personal reflections, his horrified reaction to the sheer rock faces, and the terrifying thunderous cascades of mountain streams. Antoine de la Sale (c. 1388–c. 1462), author of Petit Jehan de Saintre, climbed to the crater of a volcano in the Lipari Islands in 1407, leaving us with his impressions. "Councils of mad youth" were his stated reasons for going. In the mid 15th century, Gilles le Bouvier, in his Livre de la description des pays, gave us his reason to travel and write:

Because many people of diverse nations and countries delight and take pleasure, as I have done in times past, in seeing the world and things therein, and also because many wish to know without going there, and others wish to see, go, and travel, I have begun this little book.

In 1589, Richard Hakluyt (c. 1552–1616) published Voyages, a foundational text of the travel literature genre.
Other later examples of travel literature include accounts of the Grand Tour. Aristocrats, clergy, and others with money and leisure time travelled Europe to learn about the art and architecture of its past. One tourism literature pioneer was Robert Louis Stevenson (1850–1894).
Travel literature also became popular during the Song Dynasty (960–1279) of medieval China. The genre was called 'travel record literature' (youji wenxue), and was often written in narrative, prose, essay and diary style. Travel literature authors such as Fan Chengda (1126–1193) and Xu Xiake (1587–1641) incorporated a wealth of geographical and topographical information into their writing, while the 'daytrip essay' Record of Stone Bell Mountain by the noted poet and statesman Su Shi (1037–1101) presented a philosophical and moral argument as its central purpose.
In the 18th century, travel literature was commonly known as the book of travels, which mainly consisted of maritime diaries.In 18th century Britain, almost every famous writer worked in the travel literature form.Captain James Cook's diaries (1784) were the equivalent of today's best sellers.
Safarnāma or Safarnāmé (Persian: سفرنامه‎), also spelled as safarnameh, is a travel literature written during the 11th century by Nasir Khusraw (1003-1077). It is also known as the Book of Travels and was a work that shaped the future of classical Persian travel writing.

It is an account of Khusraw's seven year journey through the Islamic world. He initially set out on a Hajj, the obligatory Pilgrimage to Mecca. Departing on March 5, 1046, Khusraw took a less than direct route, heading north toward the Caspian Sea. Throughout his travels he kept a minutely detailed journal which clearly describes many facets of life in the Islamic world of the 11th Century.

Nasir Khusraw compiled the Safarnama in a later period of his life, using notes that he had taken along his seven year journey. His prose is straightforward, resembling a travelogue as opposed to his more poetic and philosophical Diwan. Khusraw begins his Safarnama with a description of himself, his life, and his monumental decision to travel to Mecca. He recounts an extraordinary dream in which he converses with a man who encourages him to seek out that which is beneficial to the intellect. Before the dream ends, the man allegedly points towards the qibla and says nothing more. This was the impetus that drove Khusraw to perform the hajj.

In the remaining sections of the Safarnama, Khusraw describes cities and towns along the path of his journey, with particular focus on Mecca, Jerusalem, and Cairo (the capital of the Fatimid Caliphate at the time). Khusraw's work is appreciated for its detailed descriptions of these cities, with precise accounts of civic buildings and markets.