Travel books, place experience and the ‘Je ne sais quoi’ of Paris

Abstract

Paris is one of the most written about cities in English language travel literature. Experiences, images, and discourses are important for tourism realities and imaginaries. One of the ways in which they become visible is through travel literature. Although tourism scholars through interdisciplinary approaches are applying more complex theoretical analyses to various forms of travel writing, the analysis of the place experience still requires attention. The purpose of this research is to understand more deeply about place experiences in tourism through the narratives of non-fiction travel texts. For this particular study, 20 English language non-fiction travel books were analyzed for place experiences of Paris. Using hermeneutics and latent content analysis, Paris’ distinct place experiences emerged in these narratives through the themes of transformation, sensuous experiences, home and belonging, and nostalgia. The interpretation of non-fiction travel narratives demonstrated that what was important to these authors were slow pleasures, emotional connections to the past, and sensuous yet simplistic experiences. Cultural artifacts, such as art, literature, and film, need to be examined as an important component of the tourism lens. This is especially true for the non-fiction travel book. By investigating the tourist experience through travel writers' explanations and descriptions of place, one can understand more fully how important distinctive place experiences are to tourism.巴黎是英语旅行文学中广为书写的城市之一。体验、形象与论述对于旅游的真实与想象都非常重要。它们的表现方式之一就是通过旅行文学表达。尽管旅游学者从跨学科的方法应用复杂的理论方法分析了各种形式的旅行作品,但是地方体验的分析仍需关注。本研究的目的是通过叙述纪实旅行文本深入理解旅游的地方体验。本研究分析了20种英文的纪实旅行游记以了解巴黎的地方体验。利用诠释学和隐含文本分析的方法,研究发现༌在这些记述中巴黎独特的地方体验表现为城市变迁、感官体验、家与归属感以及怀旧等主题。对这些纪实游记的解读表明,巴黎对这些作者而言重要的是慢节奏的快乐、情感上与过去的联系、简单的感官体验。像艺术、文学和电影这些文化产品是透视旅游体验的重要成分༌仍需进一步考察༌纪实游记尤其如此。通过研究旅行作家对地方的解读与描绘来理解旅游体验༌我们可以更充分地理解独特的地方体验对旅游的意义。