With the UK firmly in Winter’s icy grasp, there’s no better time to curl up with a good book. We’ve selected our favourite literary destinations, places to inform and inspire…
London
The city of Charles Dickens and Arthur Conan Doyle wears its heritage proudly; before visitors even disembark at Baker Street they’re greeted by Holmes’ immediately-recognisable pipe-puffing, deerstalker-clad silhouette decorating the Tube-station’s walls. London’s thriving lit-tourism industry provides all manner of tours and site-seeing opportunities including a Sherlock Holmes Museum at 221b Baker Street – Holmes and Watson’s fictional lodgings – as well as the Charles Dickens Museum at 48 Doughty Street, the author’s former home. Search and compare: cheap flights to London
Buenos Aires
Once home to hugely influential Magic Realist pioneers Jorge Luis Borges, Adolfo Bioy Casares and Silvina Ocampo among others, Argentina’s capital looms large in South American literary history. The former National Library (now National Centre of Music) of which Borges was director, along with his last residence in the city which sports a commemorative plaque, are two sites of particular interest to devotees. In general, Buenos Aires has a reputation as a very literate city: its annual book fair, which occurs every April, has been known to attract more than a million visitors. Search and compare: cheap flights to Buenos Aires
New York
For fans of JD Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, there is no more appropriate time to visit NYC than Winter. The novel is set in this season, and so the city is closest to as it appears therein – particularly Central Park and its surrounding area, where much of the novel takes place. Spots such its memorably-described Wollman ice-skating rink, carousel and frozen-over duck pond are popular among those to wanting to retread Holden Caulfield’s steps. Search and compare: cheap flights to New York
Prague
Prague, where Franz Kafka was born and lived much of his life, has long been an artistic and intellectual hot spot.
