Conversations with Authors - Eric Weiner (Virtual Event)
Wednesday, October 7th • 4:00pm PT/7:00pm ET
Eric Weiner
in conversation with Don George
Conversations with Authors is our free virtual event series! Join us throughout the week at 4:00pm PT/7:00pm ET for a new chat with a different author.
A note from Eric Weiner:
Dear Book Lovers,
I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Don George as much as I did. There we were—two travel writers unable to travel! Yet, thanks to the technology of our day, we were able to journey vicariously, and in our minds. I was reminded of something Henry Miller once said: “One’s destination is never a place but a new way of looking at things.” With that in mind, I’ve spent the past several long months determined to look at things differently. Books help. A lot. Here are a few of the titles I’ve immersed myself in recently.Books to Comfort:
- When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chodron
- Meditations by Marcus Aurelius
- My Bright Abyss by Christian Wiman
Books to Make You Think:
- Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino
- Civilized to Death by Christopher Ryan
Books to Scratch That Travel Itch:
- The Songlines by Bruce Chatwin,
- Sovietistan by Erika Fatland
Books to Read Slowly:
- The Black Prince by Iris Murdoch
- Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami
Be well, fellow travelers and bibliophiles. Keep reading. Keep thinking. Keep dreaming.
—Eric
Eric Weiner’s Socrates Express: In Search of Life Lessons From Dead Philosophers combines his twin passions for philosophy and global travel in a pilgrimage that uncovers surprising life lessons from philosophers around the world, from Marcus Aurelius to Arthur Schopenhauer, Confucius to Montaigne.
Eric is an award-winning journalist, bestselling author, and speaker. He is the author of the New York Times bestsellers The Geography of Bliss and The Geography of Genius, as well as the critically acclaimed Man Seeks God. Eric is a former foreign correspondent for NPR and reporter for The New York Times. He is a regular contributor to The Washington Post, BBC Travel, and AFAR, among other publications. He lives in the Washington D.C. area
Don George is an editor-at-large for National Geographic Traveler magazine, as well as host of the National Geographic Live series of conversations with notable authors. In four decades as a travel writer and editor, Don has visited more than 90 countries on five continents. He has traveled throughout—and written extensively about—Europe and Asia. He has also lived in France, Greece, and Japan, working as a translator in Paris, a teacher in Athens, and a television talk show host in Tokyo. Don is the author of The Way of Wanderlust: The Best Travel Writing of Don George, and has received dozens of writing awards, including the Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year Award.
Below, please find links to purchase their books.
Pema Chödrön's perennially best-selling classic on overcoming life's difficulties cuts to the heart of spirituality and personal growth--now in a newly designed 20th-anniversary edition with a new afterword by Pema--makes for a perfect gift and addition to one's spiritual library.
Nearly two thousand years after it was written, Meditations remains profoundly relevant for anyone seeking to lead a meaningful life.
Eight years ago, Christian Wiman, a well-known poet and the editor of Poetry magazine, wrote a now-famous essay about having faith in the face of death.
“Cities, like dreams, are made of desires and fears, even if the thread of their discourse is secret, their rules are absurd, their perspectives deceitful, and everything conceals something else.” — from Invisible Cities
In a garden sit the aged Kublai Khan and the young Marco Polo — Mongol emperor and Venetian traveler.$18.00ISBN: 9781451659115Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 DaysPublished: Avid Reader Press / Simon & Schuster - August 11th, 2020The New York Times bestselling coauthor of Sex at Dawn explores the ways in which “progress” has perverted the way we live—how we eat, learn, feel, mate, parent, communicate, work, and die—in this “engaging, extensively documented, well-organized, and thought-provoking” (Booklist) book.
Most of us have instinctive evidence the$17.00ISBN: 9780142422571Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 DaysPublished: Penguin Classics - June 26th, 2012For its twenty-fifth anniversary, a new edition of Bruce Chatwin's classic work with a new introduction by Rory Stewart
Sovietistan: Travels in Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan (Hardcover)
$28.95ISBN: 9781643133263Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 DaysPublished: Pegasus Books - January 7th, 2020An unforgettable journey through Central Asia, one of the most mysterious and history-laden regions of the world.
Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan became free of the Soviet Union in 1991.$16.00ISBN: 9780142180112Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 DaysPublished: Penguin Classics - March 25th, 2003Bradley Pearson, an unsuccessful novelist in his late fifties, has finally left his dull office job as an Inspector of Taxes. Bradley hopes to retire to the country, but predatory friends and relations dash his hopes of a peaceful retirement.
$16.00ISBN: 9780804170123Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 DaysPublished: Vintage - May 5th, 2015An instant #1 New York Times Bestseller, Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage is the remarkable story of a young man haunted by a great loss; of dreams and nightmares that have unintended consequences for the world around us; and of a journey into the past that is necessary to mend the present.
$28.00ISBN: 9781501129018Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 DaysPublished: Avid Reader Press / Simon & Schuster - August 25th, 2020The New York Times bestselling author of The Geography of Bliss embarks on a rollicking intellectual journey, following in the footsteps of history’s greatest thinkers and showing us how each—from Epicurus to Gandhi, Thoreau to Beauvoir—offers practical and spiritual lessons for today’s unsettled times.
$17.99ISBN: 9780446698894Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 DaysPublished: Twelve - January 5th, 2009Part travel memoir, part humor, and part twisted self-help guide, The Geography of Bliss takes the reader across the globe to investigate not what happiness is, but WHERE it is.
$18.00ISBN: 9781451691672Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 DaysPublished: Simon & Schuster - November 1st, 2016Tag along on this New York Times bestselling “witty, entertaining romp” (The New York Times Book Review) as Eric Winer travels the world, from Athens to Silicon Valley—and back through history, too—to show how creative genius flourishes in specific places at specific times.
In this “intellectual odyssey, traveler’s diary, and comic no$18.99ISBN: 9780446539487Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 DaysPublished: Twelve - November 6th, 2012Bestselling author of Geography of Bliss returns with this funny, illuminating chronicle of a globe-spanning spiritual quest to find a faith that fits.$16.95ISBN: 9781609521059Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 DaysPublished: Travelers' Tales Guides - September 8th, 2015As a professional travel writer and editor for the past 40 years, Don George has been paid to explore the world. Through the decades, his articles have been published in magazines, newspapers, and websites around the globe and have won more awards than almost any other travel writer alive, yet his pieces have never been collected into one volume.
