Appreciating life's amble opportunities

You could no more write a comprehensive book about walking than about breathing or sleeping. But in "The Lost Art of Walking: The History, Science, Philosophy, and Literature of Pedestrianism," Geoff Nicholson -- author of more than a dozen novels as well as, most recently, "Sex Collectors: The Secret World of Consumers, Connoisseurs, Curators, Creators, Dealers, Bibliographers, and Accumulators of 'Erotica' " -- means to try.

Fortunately, walking (unlike letter writing, watch repair, penmanship, jousting or non-digital photography) can never truly be "lost." Like travel, walking is a promiscuous discipline in need of a tight analytical leash. Even reined in, pedestrianism is typically mere prologue for the writer's interests: Think Thoreau on nature, or Walter Benjamin on the implications of getting lost in Berlin.

For his part, Nicholson seems interested in pretty much everything, devoting chapters to Los Angeles, New York, London, faith, photography, obsessives and freaks. And yet these interests seem somehow disassociated; an account of the relationship between pedestrianism and "music, movement, movies" warrants 27 pages, and no sharper point in sight.

Nicholson never lets us know how he defines a "genuine walking" scene. Funny walking styles are lumped together with serious, life-changing pilgrimages. A discussion of Erik Satie begets talk of Peter Sellers, Charlie Chaplin's insured legs, a remark that Harry Houdini made about Buster Keaton and a bit of dialogue from "The Simpsons." Going everywhere and nowhere, it's the narrative equivalent of an afternoon spent circling the same block.

Nicholson claims that the "true London walker" is "usually . . . a he" (no explanation given) and declares Patsy Cline's rendering of "Walkin' After Midnight" to be "deeply problematic," stating that "earlier, more prudish sensibilities than ours couldn't imagine what any woman would be doing in the streets after midnight unless she'd become a hooker."

The historical difficulty of women to navigate public spaces is an interesting topic that receives serious attention in Rebecca Solnit's far superior 2000 book, "Wanderlust: A History of Walking." Nicholson refers to Solnit as "oblivious and irony-free" -- a bit of misplaced vitriol.