Peeps at Many Lands: Corsica

Corsica is one of the Mediterranean most dramatic and mysterious islands, a mountainous jewel where Napoleon was born and generations of outlaws found refuge among the crags. Ernest Young's 1908 guide captures the island at a moment when old customs still thrived: the vendetta code, the shepherds wintering in the maquis, the villages perched impossibly on cliffs. Young knew Corsica intimately, and his book moves from the marshy eastern plains that once bred malaria to the cool mountain villages where islanders escaped the summer heat. He traces the long arc of conquest, from Phoenicians to Genoese to French, and paints a vivid picture of Ajaccio, Bastia, and the interior towns where time moved differently. This is travel writing before tourism, when reaching Corsica still required effort and the island retained its reputation as wild, dangerous, and unforgettable. For readers who dream of Mediterranean places untouched by the modern world, this offers a portal to 1908.