Being cut loose from the habitual is the essential gift of travel, as uncomfortable as it may be psychogically fruitful. Christianity once took our feelings of dislocation and placed them at the heart of a thesis as to the spiritual benefit of pilgrimages. Without accepting the church's analysis, we may nevertheless be inspired by its approach to the value of feeling like a lonely outsider. As much as any destination, it is isolated periods in untried hotel rooms, in paleozoic canyons, in disintegrating palaces and empty service station restaurants that facilitate an underlying psychological or spiritual point of our journeys - Alain de Botton http://theschooloflife.typepad.com/the_school_of_life/2010/06/alain-de-…
A Mundane Comedy is Dominic Kelleher's new book, which will be published in mid 2024. The introduction is available here and further extracts will appear on this site and on social media in the coming months.