About the land and over the sea

Eduard Vilde’s travelogues

Vilde’s travels were inseparable from his work. He had been keen on travelling and discovering new things already in his childhood when travelogues and adventure stories about distant places and people were his favourite reading material.

In 1889 Vilde set out for his first longer journey. To begin with, he tried to be a journalist in Riga, sending home articles about his work at the editorial office and the life in Riga. They appeared in the columns Letters from Riga and Riga Letters.

Vilde made his next longer journey that took him first to the Netherlands in the early spring of 1900. The aim of the journey that was sponsored by the owner of the newspaper Postimees/The Courier was actually to visit the Fifth World Exhibition that had just been opened in Paris. Vilde posted home shorter notes from Germany, France, Austria, Hungary and other places on his way. Having returned home, he wrote a travelogue Two Months in Central Europe. His sponsor prohibited him to   deal with socio-political problems, he was told to concentrate on art and architecture.

The editorial office of the newspaper Gazette favoured Vilde’s appeal to be sent to Central and South East Europe, that is through Austria and Hungary to the Balkans, Constantinople and Asia Minor, returning home via Greece and Italy. The journey that took him a bit over three months provided Vilde with plenty of material for his travelogue About the Land and over the Sea. In it he sketched impressive descriptions of the Adrian coast and its nature, providing the reader simultaneously with pertinent t surveys of Czech history, architecture in Budapest, impressions of theatre in Berlin and much more.

In 1904 Vilde travelled to the Crimea and Caucasus to observe the general mode of life, economic situation and culture of the Estonians there. His impressions were summed up in the richly illustrated Bulletin article under the headline Visiting the Crimean and Caucasian Estonians. In 1910 Vilde travelled to America to experience the limits of the country of limitless opportunities. His ironic notes appeared under the headline Over the Wide Water and My Imprisonment on Ellis Island. In the last decade of his life Vilde travelled to Baden-Baden for recuperation, to Hungary, Sigulda and Italy, posting shorter notes and impressions from everywhere.

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The Air of Bavaria, 1922 Päevaleht/ Daily

Man as a Football, 1919 Helsinkin Sanomat

 Two Months in Central Europe, 1900 Eesti Postimees/Estonian Courier

 Visiting the Crimean and Caucasian Estonians, 1904 Uudised/ Bulletin

 My Imprisonment on Ellis Island, 1911 Päevaleht/ Daily

 My Brother…, 1902 Teataja/ Gazette

 Impressions in South East Europe 1903 Teataja/ Gazette

 Over the Great Water, 1911 Päevaleht/ Daily