What a country is Spain for a traveller, remarked Washington Irving, where the most miserable inn is as full of adventure as an enchanted castle. He was not the first to be captivated. A country of immense contrasts, Spain has always inspired writers and travellers, and in this book the reader accompanies them into a history and culture enriched by the influence of other lands and by the wealth of a great empire, though seared as well by frequent wars.;Against a panorama of coral and gold, of violet and cristalline silver, in Ortega y Gasset"s phrase, observers as varied as Byron and Dumas, St Teresa of Avila and Virginia Woolf, Juvenal, Cervantes and Lorca combine to create a portrait of Spain.Not a book for those looking simply for the Spain of tourist brochures, or even those who share Laurie Lee"s childhood dream of walking down a white dusty road through groves of orange trees, this is for seekers after the real Spain, seen perhaps from horseback or from a steam-train; or rising from the sea like some rust-corroded wreck; from a Barcelona rooftop during the Civil War as gunfire spatters the city; or at night in the Alhambra, waiting for bottles of sherry to cool in the alabaster fountains.