Author Description

The historian Roslyn Pesman has produced a subtle, erudite and fastidiously researched account of Australian women's travel from the 1870s--when travel in Europe became popular--until 1970, when jet travel altered the concept of this key Australian rite of passage. Drawing on innumberable travel diaries, letters, and interviews, Pesman analyses the different needs and expectations of Australian women of all types and generations. After reading Pesman, it is difficult to think of a key Australian artist, intellectual or public figure who was not affected in some way by her adventures abroad.