Part cultural history, part philosophical essay, Wanderlust traces walking as political act, spiritual practice, aesthetic gesture, and everyday resistance.

Solnit moves easily between Wordsworth, urban protest, desert pilgrimage, suburban sprawl, and the gendered politics of public space. The argument unfolds associatively rather than doctrinally: walking becomes a way of thinking about attention, territory, and freedom.

What makes the book endure is its tone—curious rather than didactic—and its refusal to romanticise either nature or the city. It belongs to a lineage of writing about landscape and embodiment, but is sharper about power than most nature-adjacent nonfiction.

Readers who love Maggie Nelson would most likely enjoy, or those interested in psychogeography, feminist thought, and slow observation tend to find it durable rather than fashionable.