An increasingly popular genre – addressing issues of empire, colonialism, post-colonialism, globalization, gender and politics – travel writing offers the reader a movement between the familiar and the unknown.

In this volume, Carl Thompson:
introduces the genre, outlining competing definitions and key debates provides a broad historical survey from the medieval period to the present day explores the autobiographical dimensions of the form looks at both men and women’s travel writing, surveying a range of canonical and more marginal works, drawn from both the colonial and postcolonial era utilises both British and American travelogues to consider the genre's role in shaping the history of both nations.

Concise and practical, Travel Writing is the ideal introduction for those new to the subject, as well as a crucial overview of current debates in the field.

Reviews

'…a really exceptional introduction to the genre … as exhaustive in its coverage as it is scrupulous in its analysis of the different forms and effects of travel writing.' - Journal of Postcolonial Writing

Contents

Introduction 1. Defining the Genre Exclusive and Inclusive Definitions of Travel Writing Traveller’s Tales: Fact and Fiction in Travel Writing The Cultural and Intellectual Status of Travel Writing 2. Travel Writing through the Ages: An Overview The Ancient World Medieval Travellers and Travel Writing Early Modern Travel Writing The Long Eighteenth Century, 1660-1837 The Victorian and Edwardian Periods, 1837-1914 Travel Writing from 1914 to the Present 3. Reporting the World Discoveries and Wonders: Some Perennial Problems in Travel Writing Shifting Protocols of Authentication and Plausibility Authority and Factuality in the Modern Travel Book 4. Revealing the Self Grand Tourists, Pilgrims and Questing Knights: Self-Fashioning in Addison’s Remarks on Italy (1705) and Ralegh’s Discoverie of Guiana (1596) Writielf: Travel Writing’s Inward Turn The Imperious ‘I’ 5. Representing the Other Strategies of Othering I: Travel Writing and Colonial Discourse Strategies of Othering II: Travel Writing in a Post/Neo-Colonial Era 6. Questions of Gender and Sexuality Masculinity, Travel and Travel Writing Women’s Travel Writing in the 18th and 19th Centuries: Performing Femininity on the Page Women Travellers and Colonialism Women’s Travel Writing Today

Author Bio

Carl Thompson is Senior Lecturer in English at Nottingham Trent University.