author
Richard Twiss
1747–1821
An English travel writer with a sharp eye for detail, he turned journeys through Portugal, Spain, Ireland, and revolutionary-era Paris into lively books. He was also known for writing about chess, giving his work an unusual mix of travel, culture, and curiosity.
1 Audiobook
A Trip to Paris in July and August 1792
by Richard Twiss
About the author
Born in Rotterdam on April 26, 1747, to an English merchant family, Richard Twiss spent much of his life travelling and writing. He is remembered as an English author whose books drew on journeys across Europe, and he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1774.
His best-known works include Travels through Portugal and Spain (1775), A Tour in Ireland (1776), and A Trip to Paris (1793). These books helped build his reputation as a lively observer of places, customs, and public life, especially at a time when travel writing was one of the main ways readers discovered the wider world.
Twiss also wrote about chess, showing interests that ranged beyond travel alone. He died in 1821, leaving behind a body of work that captures both the pleasures and the arguments of eighteenth-century travel writing.