“Thought-provoking, encouraging, and inspiring” (Gretchen Rubin) reflections on the power of travel to transform our daily lives—from the iconoclastic travel writer, scholar, and author of Vagabonding.

For readers who dream of travel—or long to get back out on the road—The Vagabond’s Way explores and celebrates the life-altering essence of travel. Each day of the year features a one-page meditation on a certain aspect of the journey, anchored by words of wisdom from a variety of thinkers—from Stoic philosopher Seneca the Younger and poet Maya Angelou, to Trappist monk Thomas Merton and Grover from Sesame Street.

Author: Kate Harris
Rolf conducted the “Reader’s Guide” Q&A for Kate Harris’s book, touching on Marco Polo as muse vs. dusty interloper, the spiritual and intuitive gifts of travel, and the joys of homecoming.

Author: Tim Ferriss
Foreword: Arnold Schwarzenegger
Rolf’s chapter: “How to Earn Your Freedom”
Notable contributors: Jamie Foxx, Robert Rodriguez, Malcolm Gladwell, Margaret Cho, Edward Norton, Paulo Coelho, Rick Rubin, Alain de Botton, Sam Harris, Maria Popova, and Tony Robbins

Editors: Will Stockton & D. Gilson
Rolf’s chapter: “Jane’s Addiction’s Nothing’s Shocking”
Other acts covered in the book: the Doors, the Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Leonard Cohen, R.E.M., Digable Planets, De La Soul, the New York Dolls, the Smashing Pumpkins, Nine Inch Nails, Guided by Voices, and the Pulp Fiction Soundtrack.

There’s nothing like vagabonding: taking time off from your normal life—from six weeks to four months to two years—to discover and experience the world on your own terms. In this one-of-a-kind handbook, veteran travel writer Rolf Potts explains how anyone armed with an independent spirit can achieve the dream of extended overseas travel.

For as long as people have traveled to distant lands, they have brought home objects to certify the journey. More than mere merchandise, these travel souvenirs take on a personal and cultural meaning that goes beyond the object itself. Drawing on several millennia of examples — from the relic-driven quests of early Christians, to the mass-produced tchotchkes that line the shelves of a Disney gift shop — Rolf delves into a complicated history that explores issues of authenticity, cultural obligation, market forces, human suffering, and self-presentation. More than just objects, souvenirs are a personalized form of folk storytelling that enable people to make sense of the world and their place in it.

This book collects Rolf’s boldest, funniest, and most revealing journeys from his first 10 years as a travel writer — from crashing the set of a Leonardo DiCaprio movie in Thailand to learning the secrets of Tantric sex in a dubious Indian ashram. Each chapter contains a “commentary track” — humorous endnotes that reveal the ragged edges behind the experience and creation of each tale. Offbeat and insightful, this book is an engrossing read for students of travel writing as well as armchair wanderers.

Rolf and illustrator Cedar Van Tassel recreate the comic tale of Wenamun, an ancient Egyptian priest whose overseas voyage in search of Lebanese timber resulted in an ongoing series of fiascos. Based on a source papyrus that was lost to history until the late 19th century, the protagonist’s misadventure is delightfully entertaining, and has a…

Charting the rise of the Geto Boys from the earliest days of Houston’s rap scene, Rolf Potts documents a moment in music history when hip-hop was beginning to replace rock as the transgressive sound of American youth. In creating an album that was both sonically innovative and unprecedentedly vulgar, the Geto Boys were accomplishing something that went beyond music. To paraphrase a sentiment from Don DeLillo, this group of young men from Houston’s Fifth Ward ghetto had figured out the “language of being noticed” — which is, in the end, the only language America understands.

Note: An audiobook version of this title is available in English. When Emanuel Haldeman-Julius drowned in his garden swimming pool on July 31, 1951, he was seen as a finished man. Accused of communism by the American press, he had just lost a trial for tax evasion and faced prison. A strange ending for a…