One of the reasons Kaplan has become such a wonderful travel writer is that he isn't just reporting what he sees. For him a journey includes stopping at a place like the Great Mosque of Kairouan, which he writes, "is still the most impressive building I have seen in the Arab world. I learned more from walking around its courtyard and prayer hall, and sitting quietly beneath its teeming forest of columns, than from many of the books about Arab civilization that I have read since."

Two things become clear as Kaplan recounts such vivid impressions. First his modus operandi is to do his journalism "silently" and much of that can be done by getting to know, not just the character of the people, but the things they build. The second is Kaplan's quirky belief in never using a camera. "Photographs," he says, "can be passive and reductive. They allow us to recall too easily, omitting from view what is behind the camera, and to the sides of it."

If there is one fault with this book, it is that through Kaplan's vivid and beautiful appreciation of the past you get the guilty feeling that you really haven't done near enough exploring of the world. In that sense it is more of a challenge than a failing.

What Kaplan does especially well, particularly in Mediterranean Winter, is to explore learning as travel. Destinations, a book, a painting, a building, a view of a certain landscape are all a simple avenue to lift away the many layers of history and explore the world today.

Jackson Murphy is a commentator from Vancouver, Canada. He is a senior writer at Enter Stage Right and the editor of "Dispatches" a website that serves up political commentary 24-7.