Literature and tourism in European cities

This paper focuses on the importance of literary tourism in European cities. Although tourism promotion based on the famous literary works has been known for quite some time, it gains special importance nowadays, especially in the context on global culture represented by bestselling literary works. This is especially relevant in case of European cities, since they often become the scenes and settings for the plot des-cribed in the works of modern literature. Local myths and legends associated with European cultural destinations, in particu-lar those represented in mystery and thriller literary works, and films based on these works, become an important aspect of the development of modern city tourism. The paper uses the example of the Golem legend of Prague reflected in numerous literary pieces in order to demonstra-te the relevance of literary tourism as a form of intangible cultural heritage in European cultural destinations.