"The legs of William Wordsworth"

"His legs was pointedly condemned by all the female connoisseurs in legs that I ever heard lecture on that topic [... ] There was no absolute deformity about them; and undoubtedly they had been serviceable legs beyond the average standard of human requisition; for I calculate, upon good data, that with these identical legs Wordsworth must have traversed a distance of 175 to 180,000 English miles - a mode of exertion, which to him, stood in the stead of wine, spirits, and all other stimulants whatsoever to the animal spirits; to which he has been indebted for a life of unclouded happiness, and we for much of what is most excellent in his writings."

Med detta underbara citat från Thomas de Quincey inleder Rebecca Solnit i "Wanderlust: a history of walking" ett kapitel om en av de stora vandrande författarna, William Wordsworth.

Hon skriver också om andra, som Rosseau, Kierkegaard, Baudelaire. Och naturligtvis Walter Benjamin. Men jag saknar W. G. Sebald.