The years of travelling anxiously - Tom Sykes

Welcome to the topsy-turvy world of the anxious traveller, where panic strikes in the most serene situations, where each time you’re convinced that the symptoms are in fact physical and your lungs or heart will stop working, and the only relief is a paramedic telling you that you won’t die despite being stuck with them in an ambulance in a smoky Global Southern gridlock.

Over the last 20 years, writer and academic Tom Sykes has been lucky enough to travel all over the world. But his trips have often been marred – if not ruined – by anxiety. Sykes might hold a world record for the most panic attacks in the most places around the globe – from Lagos to Tokyo, Accra to Antalya, Manila to Portsmouth.

Part travelogue, part wellbeing memoir, The years of travelling anxiously hopes to solve a lifelong conundrum and in so doing help other anxious travellers, or indeed anyone who gets anxious about anything, wherever they go.

About the speaker

Tom Sykes is the author of five books. His reportage and travel writing has appeared in New Statesman, The Telegraph, The Scotsman, Monocle and numerous other titles all over the world. He is Associate Professor of Creative Writing and Global Journalism at the University of Portsmouth and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

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