British Travel Literature Research Articles

The Role of Richard Hakluyt’s The Principall Nauigations (1589) in the Introduction and Dissemination of Spanish Loanwords in the English Language

Richard Hakluyt’s Principall Nauigations (1589) was a landmark in the history of English travel literature which compiled and glorified the naval deeds and expeditions undertaken by the English throughout the world. This article focuses on the third volume of Hakluyt’s compilation devoted to America which gathers first-hand accounts describing the way of life and the natural environment of the new territories conquered and populated by the Spaniards. The incorporation in these texts of almost 100 borrowings from Spanish to designate elements related to sea voyages and experiences in the Spanish colonies has raised the following research questions: What kind of terms were most likely to be introduced? And, given that these Spanish terms were unfamiliar to English readers, did the authors resort to any kind of strategy to explain the meaning of the new words? This article will address these questions by setting the following objectives. (i) to compile an inventory of the Spanish terms that have been incorporated into the English texts; (ii) to classify these terms according to the lexical fields they refer to; (iii) to analyse how the meaning of these new words is explained to English readers.

SOBRE LOS VIAJEROS Y LAS ESTRATEGIAS DEL TRABAJO DE CAMPO: OLIVIA M. STONE

The outstanding set of publications that English travel literature in the second half of the 19th century dedicates to the near Atlantic, has given rise to a considerable body of studies, generally focused on the analysis of the image of the reality represented in the texts. There are nevertheless areas that research has barely touched, as is the case of the specific circumstances in which these writings were created and, especially, the field work that precedes them. For this reason, it is particularly relevant to know the traveller's positions in the fieldwork phase and the strategies used to obtain the necessary local support and the relevant information. These strategies are the focus of this contribution, based on Olivia M. Stone’s account of her journey to La Palma, which serves to examine the heterogeneity of solutions adopted.

Minds in Motion: Imagining Empiricism in Eighteenth-Century British Travel Literature by Anne M. Thell

Minds in Motion: Imagining Empiricism in Eighteenth-Century British Travel Literature by Anne M. Thell

Minds in Motion: Imagining Empiricism in Eighteenth-Century British Travel Literature

Minds in Motion: Imagining Empiricism in Eighteenth-Century British Travel Literature

Minds in Motion: Imagining Empiricism in Eighteenth-Century British Travel Literature by Anne M. Thell

<i>Minds in Motion: Imagining Empiricism in Eighteenth-Century British Travel Literature</i> by Anne M. Thell

Minds in Motion: Imagining Empiricism in Eighteenth-Century British Travel Literature by Anne M. Thell

Reviewed by: Minds in Motion: Imagining Empiricism in Eighteenth-Century British Travel Literature by Anne M. Thell M-C. Newbould Anne M. Thell. Minds in Motion: Imagining Empiricism in Eighteenth-Century British Travel Literature, Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell, 2017. Pp. xvii + 267. $105. Ms. Thell's title captures the principal concern of this engaging and erudite study: how, at distinctive points across the long eighteenth century, travel writing challenged and illuminated new aspects of empirical enquiry and its communication, and provided an apt testing ground for the period's debates about experience, perception, and their representation. As her introduction suggests, however, her chosen authors—Cavendish, Dampier, Defoe, Hawkesworth, and Johnson—operate across unstable generic boundaries. The constant tension between "scientific [End Page 110] modes of knowledge production" and "their necessarily literary representations in narrative" provides this study's backbone; its vertebrae are defined by the differing contexts in which each limb of study is articulated. Cavendish's Blazing World (1666) exemplifies "issues of authority, perspective, and imagination" that transform travel into an activity generated "by the human mind." Set against the backdrop of contemporaneous debates led by the Royal Society with regard to the appropriate mode for describing natural phenomena, Blazing World enables Cavendish to "critique" the "experimental programme" this institution proposed by promoting the imagination, which fuels the "quick movements of the mind guided by reason" to enable "intellectual fecundity and ability." Using this awareness of "constant flux and motion" Cavendish adopts multiple "subject positions" to explore and challenge other perspectives, the better to understand her own: "looking inward is the only way of viewing the vast spaces that lie beyond the self." Dampier's New Voyage Round the World (1697) engages with comparable "epistemological issues" but "from the opposite direction by taking to unsustainable extremes the rhetoric of modest witnessing." The empirical traveler's attempt to produce "natural history" in this period demonstrates the "nascent concepts of objectivity" that other critics suggest emerged in later periods. Yet Dampier struggles to reconcile the "plain" account of natural history advocated by the Royal Society with the realization that his own subjectivity repeatedly intrudes. His text consistently confronts the problem of generic instability—the boundaries of travel writing are permeable to other types of first-hand account (history, autobiography)—thus questioning "how empirical detachment can be integrated into the innately solipsistic space of narrative." Defoe, by contrast, was acutely aware of—and actively engages with—the generic permeability of travel writing. His New Voyage Round the World (1724) invites imaginative recreation. Defoe deploys visual metaphors that encourage readers to "view" possibilities beyond the narrative's immediate descriptive contours; this is "an active process of reading" that "enables an augmented perception that outstrips the limits of the body." The connections (and differences) between this and the discussion of Cavendish are salient rather than distinct. Nevertheless, Ms. Thell's account of the New Voyage—deftly woven in places with other key texts—produces an engaging discussion of the possibilities and perilous unreliability of subjective travel writing. Defoe creates "blank personae" who effectively serve as "avatars"; through them, readers can hear multiple viewpoints telling the same story, but from different perspectives. This parallel with "virtual experience," theories of which are perhaps insufficiently established here, anticipates Kames's later notion of "ideal presence," a touchstone at subsequent points. The notion of multiple perspectives in the single travel text adopts new angles in Hawkesworth's Account of the Voyages … (1773), based on the journals of several participants in Captain Cook's Pacific explorations. Nascent concerns touched on in previous chapters about the novelistic narrativization of a supposedly objective travel account were more urgent by the time Hawkesworth undertook his commission. As his preface demonstrates, he was self-consciously aware of the potentially contentious choice to adopt a first-person voice to narrate experiences he did not [End Page 111] have himself, bringing fresh pertinence to Kames's concept of ideal presence. Hawkesworth exposed the "literary" qualities of his own account "as purely rhetorical constructs," and so compelled readers "to acknowledge that even within the domain of navigational writing certain guarantees of credibility serve aesthetic as well as epistemological functions." The negative furor following its publication...

A Cultural Median: One Thousand Nights and a Night before 1700

With tales that date as far back as the ninth century, One Thousand Nights and a Night is one of the earliest seminal texts to first expose the West to Eastern life and culture. Following their translation, their extensive influence upon eighteenth century French and British travel literature and nineteenth century European and American literature, became an established fact. However, this has hardly been the case among the Arab literary tradition, where the tales have been initially neglected in both their oral and written forms. This paper traces the reception and impact of The Nights on European narrative, poetic, and dramatic productions even before transaltion to highlight its significance as a cultural median and, in the process, elaborates upon its Arab neglect. Such an exposition serves to subvert the claim that the texts translation was an act of exploitation by the west. Indeed, its early impact upon the literature and imagination of the West indicates a reception that precedes and runs parallel to the West's material and politically oriented imperial influence.

Spigolature di anglicismi: a proposito di leggings e altri (recenti) forestierismi

AbstractThe present article focuses on English-Italian language contact. In detail, we will show that supposedly recent borrowings such as leggings (GRADIT: 2004) or steward (1928) can already be observed in 19th-century Italian translations of English travel literature.

Yorick’s “besoin de Voyager”: Mobility and Sympathy in Laurence Sterne’s Sentimental Journey

This article examines Laurence Sterne’s Sentimental Journey in the context of eighteenth-century British travel literature. While literary crit ics generally read Sterne’s work as a sentimental novel, contemporary readers initially interpreted the text as a travel narrative. It is my argu ment that travel writing, particularly the motion entailed in travelling, plays a significant role in Sterne’s critical examination of sympathy and its cultural function during this period. By narrating in great detail his narrator Yorick’s mobility and the effects it has on his sentimental encounters, Sterne illustrates how sympathy is not only difficult to acti vate and therefore requires added stimulation in the form of motion, but also does not necessarily result in charitable actions, a moral failure that is dramatized by the literal distance Yorick maintains from the objects of his sympathy. Calling to mind the figurative distance that constitutes an integral part of Adam Smith’s formulation of sympathy in The Theory of Moral Sentiments, the distance Yorick establishes through his travels indi cates sympathy’s failure to bridge the emotional and socioeconomic dis tance between individuals, thereby highlighting sympathy’s limitations as a moral instrument. I argue that by using Yorick’s repeated acts of sympa thy to explore the problems of sentimentalism, Sterne both draws from and innovates the tradition of employing imaginary voyages to engage in philosophical inquiries.

Between Languages and Cultures: Arabic into English Transliteration in English Travel Literature

This essay aspires to examine the use of transliteration of some words and phrases from Arabic to English in travel literature books. This has been conducted by exploring the transliterated Arabic words and phrases, and comparing the different transliterations of the same words and phrases by different writers. It investigates the way that the travel writers employ in making plural nouns, the use of the definite article (Al) (ال), and Al-tashdid (the duplication of a letter). The conclusion drawn is that travel literature writers resort to transliteration for three reasons; one of the main reasons is that sometimes there is no one-to-one correspondence; the second main reason suggests that transliteration avoids the loss of meaning; and the third one stems from the fact that transliteration helps to find transculturation between cultures. The contributions of this essay would be of concern to scholars, who are interested in Arabic into English transliteration, specifically in English travel literature. According to the researchers’ knowledge, this essay can be considered a leading pioneer study in the field that deals with transliteration from Arabic into English in English travel literature.

The Concept of Others and the Sense of Superiority in the Nineteenth Century English Travel Literature among the Arabs

لقد استحوذ مفهوم على اهتمام المستشرقين الذين اختلطو بشعوب ما وراء البحار من امثال س.م. دوتي و ر.برتون. وقد عنى هذا البحث بدراسة مفهوم هذا المصطلح عندهم معتمدين على الرؤيا الكلاسيكية لهذا المصطلح. فهو يحمل في طياته كما اشار البحث معنى تميزيا عنصريا يقوم على افضلية الغرب على الشرق وهو معنى ان صدق في جوانب فلا يصدق في جوانب آخرى. وكان جل هم الفكتورين تصوير الآخرين على انهم دوني ، فالمغالاه بأن الشرقين لا يستحقون الأرض التي يعيشون عليها مثال على ذلك . وعلى هذا فقد درس البحث آراء ومواقف الغرب في الشرق من خلال منهج وصفي ناقد للوصول الى نتائج علمية في هذه القضية ؛ مسلحين بالمرسوم المورث بأن قوة الأوروبيين تنبع من ضعف الآخرين.

Comparaciones (no odiosas) entre la (Royal) Irish Constabulary y la Guardia Civil Española en los relatos de viajeros de habla inglesa por la España de los siglos XIX y XX

During the last decades of the 19th century and the first of the 20th century the Spanish Guardia Civil received multiple appraisals from English-speaking travellers in Spain at the time – all of them British– as regards this body’s efficiency, professionalism and incorruptibility. The comparison of this Spanish military corps with the (Royal) Irish Constabulary, a police corps of similar professional prestige, is constant in the English travel literature of the period, to the extent of becoming a recurrent literary cliché. The time span during which both corps collect such laudatory comparisons in the travel accounts of the age coincides almost exactly with the life of the Royal Irish Constabulary, that is, from 1867, the year when the Irish corps was awarded the adjective of “Royal” as a recognition of their loyalty and meritorious work in the repression of the popular and pro-independence riots and their support to the colonial interests of the metropolis, up to its final disappearance in 1922. From then on the Guardia Civil was more frequently compared to other famous and prestigious foreign police forces such as the French Gendarmerie, the Italian Carabinieri, the F.B.I., the New York Police and the Canadian Mounted Police.

Science, Commerce, and Imperial Expansion in British Travel Literature: Hugh Clifford’s and Joseph Conrad’s Malay Fiction

Conrad`s novels, specifically the Lingard Trilogy- Almayer`s Folly, An Outcast of the Islands, and The Rescue- and Lord Jim, set in the Southeast Asian or Malay Archipelago can be considered travel literature that played a significant role in British imperial expansion. Conrad`s Malay novels were based not only on his experience in the region during his commercial journey but also on information from earlier travel writings about the Malays and their customs, including James Brooke`s journals. The English traders in Conrad`s novels, namely Lingard and Jim, were partly modeled on Brooke, the White Rajah, who founded and ruled the English colony on the northwest of Borneo in the 1840s. The white traders in Conrad`s novels, who act as enlightened rulers, represent the British commercial expansionism, which was obscured by the phenomenon of the civilizing mission in the late nineteenth century. On the other hand, the colonial official Clifford`s tales and novels about British Malaya demonstrate the typical travel accounts of the late nineteenth century that stress the civilizing mission over commercial exploitation. The concept of the enlightening mission was rooted in evolutionary anthropological thinking, which developed as part of the natural history in the early nineteenth century. In fact, the development of natural history, stimulating British expansion in search of commercially exploitable resources and lands, enabled travel writing as the collection of natural knowledge to become a profitable business. In Conrad, the white characters are mainly traders acting as colonial rulers, while in Clifford, they are scientific rulers with their commercial interests rarely apparent. In sum, Conrad`s novels reveal that the new imperialism of the civilizing mission is still a commercial one, which disturbs rather than contributes to the imperial expansion-in contrast to other travel literature such as Clifford`s.

The Debated Lands: British and Amencan Representations of the Balkans by Andrew Hammond (review)

746 SEER, 87, 4, OCTOBER 2OOg Hammond, Andrew. TheDebatedLands:British andAmerican Representations ofthe Balkans. University ofWales Press,Cardiff, 2007.vii + 328 pp. Notes. Bibliography. Index.£60.00. The applicationof postcolonialtheory'sconceptualarsenalto historically determined regionsthatdid notexperience 'conventional' colonialdominationby theWestis not a novelpracticeby now. There have been a fair numberof attempts to analysevariouspartsof EasternEurope, as well as Northern and CentralAsia, withthe help of toolsborrowedfromthe postcolonial context. The BalkanPeninsula, in particular, has been steadily attracting scholars,both fromwithinand outsidethe region,who have attempted tomakesenseofitspastandpresent (dis)contents through recourse to thepostcolonial paradigm.Whilesuchcritical engagements have uncovered powerrelations thatearlierremainedunnoticedand thusprovideda curefor'cultural myopia'(Leela Gandhi,Postcolonial Theory, Edinburgh, 1998, p. 73), theyhave also frequently led to the obscuringof historical and cultural-geographical differences and theerasureofspecific manifestations of individual agency.The endresult ishomogenization ofdivergent partsofthe globethrough thesystematic demonization ofWestern oppressors ofonekind or anotherand the bestowalof honoraryvictimhood upon a varietyof nationaland/ or ethnicgroups. AndrewHammond'sreadingofBritish and American travel writing about theBalkanPeninsula(1850S-2006) showsremarkable familiarity witha wide rangeof interpretative strategies specific to postcolonial critique.However, thepostcolonial paradigm'sextension to SouthEasternEurope'sambiguous terrain, whichhe has undertaken in thebookunderconsideration, in order to attest Western denigration and/oradmiration ofprimitivism, often seems bothcontrived and simplistic. An impression ofoversimplification is likewise producedby the author'sdefinition of the Balkans:forhim,the countries making up theregionare 'Romania,Bulgaria, Albaniaand theformer Yugoslavia 'becausethisis how '[it] is commonly defined in British commentary' (p. 2). One couldquibbleaboutHammond'sdefinition and askwhyhe has chosentoexcludeGreecefrom it.Or, leavingasidethevexedquestion ofthe beginning and theend oftheBalkans,one mayqueryhisviewoftheregion as an indivisible entity withlargelyinterchangeable parts.This conception structures hisanalysis throughout thebook and itseemsto me thatthereis little inthetravel narratives he studies tojustify it. Hammond'sviewoftheBalkansappearsall themorepuzzlingwhenone considers thatMaria Todorova's1997study Imagining the Balkans is theshaping influence behindhis book (see p. 3, 7-8, 41-42, 283). Todorova explicitly warnsagainst therepresentation oftheregion as 'a homogeneous [.. .] abstraction '(Imagining theBalkans, New York and Oxford,1997,p. iv) and stresses the historical parameters of its negativeimage.Those parametersshiftin Hammond'sbookseveraltimes, themoststriking examplebeingthetracing ofnegative 'balkanism' all thewaybackto SirHenryBlount's1637Voyage to theLevant (p. 5). Despite 'the exasperation and dread', whichHammond discovers in thistravelmemoir(p. 5), it is extremely doubtful thatBlount perceivedthe regionthatcame to be knownas theBalkans lateron as a reviews 747 politicaland cultural-geographical entity in itsownright. The use of'Levant in histitle is significant and itis a pitythatrelatively fewcommentators have attempted to studythe fullhistorical, politicaland culturalimplications of theearlier tendency toviewmostofSouthEasternEuropethrough theprism of 'Levantinisrri and thuslinkit symbolically to the EasternMediterranean. iBalkanism' to theextent thatit can be interpreted as a discourse suigeneris, camelaterbutinherited someoftheconstituent imagesoftheformer. Unfortunately , theauthorof TheDebated Landsmakesno attempt to studyanyof the region's'pre-Balkarì images; 'Levantine'is only mentionedas one of the 'pejoratives' attachedby theWestto South EasternEurope,alongside 'Byzantine' and 'Balkan'(p. 284). Despitea tendency toreductionism, whichisoften inevidenceinthebook, Hammonddoesrealizethecomplexity ofWestern responses toSouthEastern Europeand stresses theneedfora nuancedapproachto them.He is critical ofMaria Todorova'snotionof(negative) 'balkanism' because itis 'a homogeneousaffair , downplaying anyoppositional strands' (p. 8). His own stated aim is to provethat'theregionhas enteredtheWesternimagination as a farmoreunstableand mutableconcept(as a seriesofbalkanisms, as itwere)' (p. 8). In myview,suchan aim wouldpresupposeclose readingofspecific textsand criticalassessment of theirauthors'social,politicaland cultural backgrounds as wellas attitudes totheregion'sdiverse populations and affiliationswithany of the external politicalpowersinvolvedin it. Hammond, however, undertakes primarily a study ofdominant patterns ofperception. He looksat representations fromtravelogues groupedchronologically in three sections, each ofwhichexpresses theprevailing mode(s)ofperception: 18501914 ('Victorian'); 1914-39(wartime alliance,escapist, modernist); 1939-2006 (Cold War and postmodern). The travelogues are predominantly ofBritish provenance.Only a smallnumberofAmericantextsare discussedand no attempt ismadetosingle outtheir specific features ortostudy therelationship betweenthemand British travel literature. What may be termed a paradigmof unadulterated denigration dominates the book'sfirst and third sections and theoveralleffect is one ofimpoverishment as individualmotivation or responsesto specificpoliticaland economic situations are buried under an avalanche of generalizedmoral stricture. Victoriantravellers are systematically takento taskforwishingto further British imperial interests in theBalkansthrough theimputation ofsavagery, barbarismand generalfecklessness to the indigenes, fraternizing with'the masterraces'and/orusingtheirsojournsin theregionto enactfantasies of 'imaginedcolonialism'(p. 77). Disregardof individual agencyand personal motivation is explainedthrough a reference to 'theforceoftradition [which] reduced the cross-cultural encounterto a limitedrange of motifsthat functioned toenhancethetraveller fora homereadership' (p. 77).Whilesuch a modelofinterpretation does shedlighton certain representations oftravel intheBalkans,itswiderapplication wouldmakethestudy oftravel literature - or,forthatmatter, ofmostotherkindsofwriting - completely pointless. TtQ wpiiknpcsps hprnme annarpnt wVipn HanmnnnH atfpmnts to Hpal...

Virile Turks and Maiden Ireland: Gender and National Identity in Early Modern English Travel Literature

This article examines the role of gender in depictions of national identity in early modern English travel literature. I show that human sexual relationships were believed to be echoed in relations between territories, which were often represented as masculine or feminine. Travellers used metaphors representing marriage, seduction and rape to describe geopolitical relationships, including colonialism, tribute payments and rebellion. Representations of Ireland and the Irish, and the Ottoman Empire and the Turks are among the most revealing. I argue that such metaphors were especially favoured by travel writers because gender was believed to be inherently mutable, thus providing a variety of easily understood and mutually accepted narratives to describe international political relationships.

Seventeenth-century English travel literature and the significance of foreign foodways1

Early modern English travel writers describing Europe often included detailed descriptions of foreign foodways in their narratives. These descriptions served not only to satisfy readers’ curiosity about the details of foreign life, but as a means of marking cultural differences. In particular, the role of such descriptions was to emphasize and reinforce attitudes about foreign countries that were not specifically related to food. Instead, the underlying theme was international power relations. This tendency is most clearly revealed by comparing representations of the foodways of the Irish and the Ottoman Turks. These regions were superficially described as having similar traits, such as simple foods, lack of social distinctions in the serving of food, and a lack of proper accoutrements of food serving. However, similar practices were interpreted differently according to the needs of the authors. While the Irish were regarded as bestial and unskilled, the Turks were seen as deliberately austere, much as the English viewed themselves. Both the English and the Turks were also able to manufacture refined edibles if they wished. The typical austerity of Turkish foodways was believed to contribute to their military discipline, a valuable lesson for the English.

Gender, nature, empire: women naturalists in nineteenth century British travel literature

Among the many British women abroad in the late nineteenth century were a number of travellers who toured the American West with a naturalist’s pen and sketchbook. California, with its giant sequoias and redwoods, scenic Yosemite Valley and Sierra Nevada, and the Mediterranean flora of the southern coasts, especially attracted travellers with a naturalist orientation. We examine the botanical and naturalist writings and art of two well‐known (and well‐heeled) world travellers – Constance Gordon Cumming and Marianne North – and another more obscure British aristocrat, Theodora Guest, sister of the Duke of Westminster, who travelled in California in the late nineteenth century. We examine relationships among these elite women’s association with the Romantic aesthetic and naturalist traditions, natural sciences, class‐based associations between women and flowers, and emergent environmentalism. The works of these women indicate the process by which natural history rhetorics and styles became embedded within gender, class, and imperial relations; and how the division of natural history into professional and amateur domains relegated women to discursive margins.

Morocco in English travel literature: a look at J. G. Jackson's account

James Grey Jackson's account of Morocco, written at the start of the nineteenth century, is, even today, one of the best pieces of travel literature about the country. Its originality lies in the fact that its author spent 16 years in the country, learning its language and absorbing its culture. The result is a description and analysis which lacks the orientalist prejudices of the period and gives insights to cultural practices and attitudes which are still evident today.

British Literary Travellers in Southeast Asia in an Era of Colonial Retreat

Some write because they travel, and some travel because they write. A large number of progessional writers, not just travel-writers, have derived inspiration from travel: equally, a large number of travellers, who are not professional writers, have nevertheless often felt compelled to encapsulate their experience in literary form. It is the aim of this paper to survey such British travel literature relating to Southeast Asia during the period of massive transformation dating approximately from the ‘20S to the ’ 50S of this century. It is not intended to be comprehensive, but representative of the major landmarks of that literature along with some lesser-known works of particular interest.

The peculiar peregrinations of John Taylor the water‐poet: A study in seventeenth‐century British travel literature

The peculiar peregrinations of John Taylor the water‐poet: A study in seventeenth‐century British travel literature