Customer Reviews

Around the World on a Bicycle (Classics of American Sport)

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San Francisco to Boston, England to the Balkans, Turkey to Afghanistan, India, China and Japan: Stevens boldly cycled where no bicycler had gone before!

On the recommendation of a friend, I've been looking for this book for years. So I was delighted to learn that it had just been republished for the first time since 1902. Yes, 1902: Stevens started his trip in 1884. This intrepid wheelman (note: "wheel" is singular because Stevens' cycle was so dominated by the 50 inch front wheel he would often just refer to it as his "wheel") recorded his adventures and thoughts about the people and lands he visited during 13,500 miles of cycling.

As you might expect from a bicycle journalist, Stevens carefully describes the riding quality of most of the roads and trails he followed, comments on his many headers, and joked about the amount of food he could eat at the end of a long day pedaling a 41 pound bicycle. But the book is far more than a cycling story, it is a glimpse into a world that is long-gone yet still relevant. He saw the hostility between different ethnic groups in the Balkans, he visited Kurdish nomads in what is now northern Iraq, commented on how the mullahs were preventing Iran from modernizing, etc. A man of his times, some of his words (e.g., not particularly flattering portraits of the Native Americans that he met) would definitely not be considered politically correct 110 years after he wrote them. But all in all, it was a delightful read.

Truly a classic traveler's tale, one that I'd been tempted to pay $100+ for a used copy of last year. This is an excellent reprint of the original, with all its illustrations, plus some of Stevens's other writings on his trip, with a well-footnoted introduction.

It's amazing to think that Stevens was able to complete such a journey over 100 years ago on such a beastly bike. With no gears and bad roads, it seems he had to walk (or trundle) his bike as much as he rode it. It is especially interesting to see just how different some parts of the world are now, and yet just how little other parts of the word have changed since his journey. More than a travel book or bicycle adventure, the book is an interesting time capsule from long ago that is a pleasure to read!

As a bicyclist with a fascination with the turn of the last century, I couldn't resist buying this book. And what an amazing journey it is! Traveling west to east through barely-tamed 1880s America, the author describes his encounters with the local people, flora and fauna - and the performance of his 'wheel'. Imagine the boldness and naivete of someone who would set out on such a trip with little or no long-distance experience! And then to sail across the ocean and continue your journey through foreign lands with just a tiny satchel of supplies - which must have been dominated by his prodigious notebook! Oh, and his trusty pistol. Imagine crossing foreign borders and attending teas with dignitaries with that piece of hardware tucked into your belt.

Although some of his descriptions of native peoples are disturbing to our 21st century sensitivities, all his descriptions seem apt for the times in which he lived. He has a natural curiosity and gives us a vivid description of every discovery and encounter. An amazing slice of history from the point of view of an extraordinary 'average' American of his time.

At almost 1100 pages(!), this is not exactly beach reading. Although some of his daily trials and tribulations become tiring, we would be left wondering what happened in the interim days if this would have been 'properly' edited to today's standards. I recommend you practice with a barbell a few weeks before ordering a copy...

I just finished reading _Riding the Edge_ and somehow felt I needed to read this for perspective. With 100 years (or so) between the efforts, different routes, and very different people it's amazing to me that barriers to travel seem even today to be more political than anything else. I had already downloaded the scanned text for the book from project Gutenberg when I found this at Amazon and thought it would be easier to read on paper. The real surprise was a link to the scanned document that the text was taken from. This is a real treasure. The image is much more readable than the text and it includes the illustrations. The price of the book is well worth access to the scanned image.