Abstract
In the eighteenth century, travel literature, like every other literary genre, was being subjected to redefinitions, restrictions, and subversions. It is a reaction away from it that produces Laurence Sterne's Sentimental Journey ; a narrowing down of its scope, away from those 'res variae', produces Goethe's account of Italy, one that many are agreed to call an 'aesthetic journey'. The Italienische Reise is one of those works by Goethe that has always elicited superlatives or a hushed, deferential tone. The question of the Romantic ideology of art as a possible foil to Goethe's account of Italy, is not difficult to solve pragmatically. Stolberg's insights, by contrast, while indebted to a culture of sentimentality that by 1816 had taken on different contours and emphases, now formed part of the notions of Christian art that his Romantic contemporaries were using in their ideological confrontation with Goethe. Keywords: Christian art; Goethe; Italienische Reise ; Laurence Sterne's Sentimental Journey ; Romantic ideology; Stolberg's Italian journey; travel literature
Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
