The best road trip for American literature lovers
If you’re a writer, English teacher or just live to read, here’s one road trip you need to make at some point in your life.
Spend a couple days making your way through New England and experience many of the best writers this country has known.
Start the tour in Sleepy Hollow, N.Y., at Washington Irving’s Sunnyside. Perhaps best known for “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” Irving is considered one of the first great writers of the country. His estate along the Hudson is beautifully restored, and just a few miles away is the Old Dutch Reformed Church and cemetery, which are featured prominently in “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.”
Next, head to Hartford, Connecticut, to tour the homes of Mark Twain and Harriet Beecher Stowe, which are conveniently located next to each other.
Known for his wit, Twain wrote many of his best-known works such as “Adventures of Tom Sawyer,” “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” and “Prince and the Pauper” while living in his home at Hartford – a quite unique three-story mansion that dates to 1874.
Next door is the home of Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of the anti-slavery novel “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” The museum aims to create a more interactive experience that inspires you to create social change just like Stowe did with her life and her masterpiece.
From here, head to the Boston area to experience two great Transcendentalist writers – Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau.
It was at Emerson’s home near Concord where he wrote “Self Reliance” and “Nature,” two of his best-known works.
Just a short drive from Emerson’s home is Walden Pond, where Thoreau (“Civil Disobedience”) went to live in 1845 to conduct his “experiment in simplicity” that was chronicled in “Walden.” A replica of his cabin was built and stones mark the site of the original cabin.
Also in Concord is Louisa May Alcott’s Orchard House. The home looks very much as is did when the Alcott family lived in the home, which is where Louisa wrote her best-known piece, “Little Women” in 1868.
In Salem, Massachusetts, you can find one of the best known historic homes in literature, The House of the Seven Gables. The house, which dates to 1668, is the setting of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s 1851 novel by the same name. The tour also includes a visit to Nathaniel Hawthorne’s birthplace and a walk through the Seaside Gardens.
