By The Ionian Sea

“By The Ionian Sea” is a 1901 work by George Gissing that contains notes and diary entries from his time spent travelling around Italy. Contents include: “From Naples”, “Paola”, “The Grave Of Alaric”, “Taranto”, “Dulce Galaesi Flumen”, “The Table Of The Paladins”, “Cotrone”, “Faces By The Way”, “My Friend The Doctor”, “Children Of The Soil”, “The Mount Of Refuge”, “Catanzaro”, “The Breezy Height”, “Squillace”, “Miseria”, etc. George Robert Gissing (1857–1903) was a British novelist. From 1880 to 1903, he published 23 novels and also worked as a teacher and tutor during his life. Other notable works by this author include: “The Nether World” (1889) and “The Odd Women” (1893). This vintage book is highly recommended for fans of travel writing and is not to be missed by collectors of Gissing's seminal work.

By the Ionian Sea: Notes of a Ramble in Southern Italy is a travelogue by George Gissing. Gissing was a late 19th century novelist, here writing about his culture trip to Calabria in Italy. Excerpt: "Last night the wind changed and the sky began to clear; this morning I awoke in sunshine, and with a feeling of eagerness for my journey. I shall look upon the Ionian Sea, not merely from a train or a steamboat as before, but at long leisure: I shall see the shores where once were Tarentum and Sybaris, Croton and Locri. Every man has his intellectual desire; mine is to escape life as I know it and dream myself into that old world which was the imaginative delight of my boyhood."

Here is the book in which Gissing, for once, turned away from the sombre and care-laden scenes that dominated his outlook as a novelist, and painted at first hand a picture of that classic South whose art and literature and living sense of beauty were the hidden mainspring of his being. Appreciation of Gissing's genius is steadily growing, and these finely polished sketches of travel reflect an essential part of his experience. With an Introduction by Virginia Woolf

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Excerpt from By the Ionian Sea: Notes of a Ramble in Southern Italy This is the third day of Sirocco, heavy-clouded, Sunless. All the colour has gone out of Naples the streets are dusty and stifling. I long for the moun tains and the sea. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

"The book is worth reading from beginning to end," said The Nation in June 1905, upon the first American publication of this classic work of travel literature. The second of two memorable trips to the Mediterranean. The second was to Calabria and the wild Italian coast south of Naples. From bad food to filthy inns and dangerously watered wine, to a strange malarial-type fever which kept him bedridden for days, Gissing suffered all for the sake of viewing the sites and old ruins of "Magna Graecia," and to see for himself the classical cities he called his "land of romance." Filled with humor, pathos, and captivating landscapes, By the Ionian Sea continues to inspire the traveler, while re-educating the reader in the glories of this still-forgotten corner of Italy.