Elusive Traveller

This is the first-ever biography of the Victorian journalist, newspaper editor and travel writer Andrew Wilson (1830-1881). Born in Bombay, he was educated in the universities of Edinburgh and Tubingen, subsequently editing various newspapers in Bombay, Karachi and Hongkong. A prolific contributor to Blackwood's Magazine, he became widely known for his book The Abode of Snow, the graphic description of a journey in the Himalaya. Based mainly on Wilson's unpublished letters to John and William Blackwood, the biography reveals a striking personality whose life and career afford fascinating glimpses of the cultural, political and religious history of 19th-century Scotland in the context of the British Empire.