The great American humorist and novelist Mark Twain, a. k. a. Samuel L. Clemens (1835-1910), was also an indefatigable traveler, crossing the Atlantic 27 times, in addition to months spent traversing the country and the years on the Mississippi River. His first trip was to New York in 1853 when he was eighteen. In 1907, his last European sojourn, intended to be brief, was to Oxford University to accept an honorary degree; Twain stayed nine months. During his lifetime he visited Gibraltar, Paris, Milan, Florence, Rome, Athens, Constantinople, Odessa, Yalta, Geneva, Damascus, Jerusalem, Bombay, Benares, Tangier, Alexandria, Sydney, Melbourne, and the Fiji Islands, among many other places.

Drawn from The Innocents Abroad, Roughing It, Life on the Mississippi, A Tramp Abroad, and Following the Equator, this anthology presents a generous selection from the best of Twain's travel writing.