Non-fiction review: Wanderers, by Kerri Andrews

This book is part of my "series" of books about walking.

 

Title: Wanderers: A History of Women Walking
Author: Kerri Andrews
Publication info: 2020, Reaktion Books, 288 pages
Source: Library

Publisher's Blurb (Goodreads):
Offering a beguiling view of the history of walking, Wanderers guides us through the different ways of seeing—of being—articulated by ten pathfinding women writers.

“A wild portrayal of the passion and spirit of female walkers and the deep sense of ‘knowing’ that they found along the path.”—Raynor Winn, author of The Salt Path
 
“I opened this book and instantly found that I was part of a conversation I didn't want to leave. A dazzling, inspirational history.”—Helen Mort, author of No Map Could Show Them

This is a book about ten women over the past three hundred years who have found walking essential to their sense of themselves, as people and as writers. Wanderers traces their footsteps, from eighteenth-century parson’s daughter Elizabeth Carter—who desired nothing more than to be taken for a vagabond in the wilds of southern England—to modern walker-writers such as Nan Shepherd and Cheryl Strayed. For each, walking was integral, whether it was rambling for miles across the Highlands, like Sarah Stoddart Hazlitt, or pacing novels into being, as Virginia Woolf did around Bloomsbury. Offering a beguiling view of the history of walking, Wanderers guides us through the different ways of seeing—of being—articulated by these ten pathfinding women.

My Review:
This book opened up some different ways of thinking about walking as a physical and intellectual activity. By focusing on women who both walked and wrote, the tilt of the book is away from adventuring or exploration, and towards walking as both a way of being in the world and a way of thinking about it.

In some ways, the book was less enjoyable for this tilt. The author is pretty focused on the more philosophical aspects of the women she profiles, and their writings. There's a definite lit crit element that even after all these years (some 30 since finishing grad school) puts me on alert. Other readers may not share this gut reaction.

Above all, however, the women profiled, especially some of the earlier ones, leave me marveling and how much and how far they walked. When I think about the absurd clothes they had to wear and the shoes they had back then, I'm just sort of boggled. Their feet must have been so tough. (On reflection, that is very much the reaction of a hiker, and one who can't hike without the right boots, my custom insoles, wicking garments...) (Cheryl Strayed is sort of an exception to this, though when I read her book I was amazed she made it onto the PCT, let alone all the way to the Columbia River).

Women like Virginia Woolf and Anais Nin did much or most of their walking in urban environments, which forces me to open up my definition of hiking. When I was young and touring Europe, I, too, walked everywhere in the cities I visited, so it's not a totally alien idea. But these days, I'm very much not drawn to cities. It's good to be reminded that they can feed the soul too, not just the wilderness. 

My Recommendation: 
An interesting read, in general, but readers should know going in that there's a fair amount of analysis of the women's writing in an at least moderately academic vein. Nothing wrong with that, but it may not be for all readers.

FTC Disclosure: I checked Wanderers: A History of Women Walking out of the library, and received nothing from the writer or publisher for my honest review. The opinions expressed are my own and those of no one else. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."  

 

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 ©Rebecca M. Douglass, 2026 

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