Travel Literature Through the Ages (EN 3217)

Semester I, 2001-2002

Lecturer: Dr. Srilata Ravi, Department of English Language and Literature , National University of Singapore

Description

Travel literature whether inspired by pleasure, pilgrimage, official duty, geographical exploration or profit emerges as a prominent genre in virtually all times and cultures. Travel narratives mediate between fact and fiction, autobiography and ethnography, combining a number of academic disciplines, literary categories and social codes. They also raise issues concerning power and self- perception, cultural representation as well as imagination. This module will examine a variety of narratives of voyage through the ages. Selected Readings will include literary accounts of actual travelers, purely fictive work, metaphoric narratives of spiritual quests and postmodern discourses of displacement.

Aims

The first section of the module will examine the conventions of travel and travel writing. The second section will look at discourses of postcolonialism and postmodernism to study what happens to travel writing in an age of what Homi Bhabha calls "transnational dissemination". The third section will look at women's travel writing. It will assess its usefulness as a tool for feminist critique and examine the role of women's travel writing in reconstituting the gendered subject.

Course Evaluation

Tutorial participation is compulsory

Primary Texts

1. Equiano's Travels ( London: Heinmann Educational books 1967) edited by Paul Edwards.
2. Selections from Burton, Richard Francis , First Footsteps in East Africa. Edited with an introduction and additional chapters by Gordon Waterfield (London : Routledge & Paul, 1966) .
   
3. Selections form Bird, Isabella L, The Golden Chersonese : the Malayan Travels of a Victorian Lady, (Singapore : Oxford University Press , 1990); with an introduction by Wang Gungwu.
4. Twain, Mark Roughing it, Innocents Abroad ( New York: Viking Press, 1984).
5. Miller, Henry, The Colossus of Maroussi, (London: Heinemann , 1960) Originally published by Colt, 1941.
   
6. Paul, Theroux, The Old Patagonian Express : by Train through the Americas ( London : Hamish Hamilton, 1979).
   
7. Kincaid, Jamaica, A Small Place (New York: Farrar Straus Giroux, 1988).
   

Secondary Texts

• Selected texts from Adams Percy G (ed), Travel Literature Through the Ages : an Anthology (New York : Garland , 1988).
• Selected chapters from Adams Percy G , Travel Literature and the evolution of the novel (Univ Press of Kentucky, 1983).
• Selected chapters from Kowalewski. Michael (ed) Temperamental Journeys : Essays on the Modern Literature of Travel (Athens : University of Georgia Press , 1992).
• Pratt Mary Louise "Travel Narrative and Imperialist Vision" in James Phelan and Peter J. Rabinowitz (eds.), Understanding Narrative (Columbus : Ohio State University Press , 1994.);pp199-221.
• Selected chapters from Holland Patrick and Graham Huggan (ed) Tourists with Typewriters : Critical Reflections on Contemporary Travel Writing (Ann Arbor : University of Michigan Press, 1998).
• Selected chapter from Mills, Sara , Discourses of Difference : an Analysis of Women's Travel Writing and Colonialism ( London ; New York : Routledge , 1991).
• Selected chapters from Morris Mary, Nothing to Declare: Memoirs of a Woman Traveling Alone, (London : Hamilton , 1988).
• Baudrillard, Jean, Amerique. translated by Chris Turner, (London ; New York : Verso , 1988).
  

Lecture Schedule

Tutorials

Venue:

TI-Tuesday 10-11am
T2 Tuesday 1-2pm
T3 Tuesday 2-3pm

Topics
Tutorials
See tutorial page for specific set of questions for each tutorial session

Week3: Week beginning August 13
Topic: Cultural History of Travel
Reading:
"Travel", in Michael Kowalewski (ed), Temperamental Journeys (Athens. London: Univ of Georgia Press: 1992 )

Week 4: Week beginning August 20
Topic: Conventions of Travel writing
Reading:
Selections from Adams, Travel Literature Through the Ages (New York: Garland Publishing:1988)
(Chardin, James Cook, Alexis de Tocqueville, Henry James)

Week 5: Week beginning August 27
Topic: The captive as traveler Equiano's Travels
Reading:
Equiano's Travels

Week 6: Week beginning September 3
RECESS

Week 7: Week beginning September 10
Topic: Americans in Europe
Reading:
Mark Twain, Innocents Abroad

Week 8: Week beginning September 17
Topic: Imperial encounters
Readings:
Selections from Isabella Bird, The Golden Chersonese (Letters VI, VII. VIII. IX)
From Richard Burton, First Footsteps in East Africa. ("Departure from Aden") Edited with an introduction and additional chapters by Gordon Waterfield (London : Routledge & Paul, 1966)

Week 9: Week beginning September 24
Topic: Travels in Greece
Reading:
The Colossus of Maroussi

Week 10: Week beginning October 1
Topic: The spiritual journey
Reading:
The Colossus of Maroussi


Week 11: Week beginning October 8
Topic: Travel Tourism and postcoloniality
Readings:
Paul Theroux, The Old Patagonian Express
"After the Empire" in Tourists with Typewriters (Holland and Huggan (ed), 1998)

Week 12: Week beginning October 15
Topic: Women Travellers
Readings:
Selections form Mary Morris, Nothing to Declare
Mary Morris, "Women and Journeys" in Temperemental Journeys (Athens. London: Univ of Georgia Press: 1992)
"Gender and other troubles" in Tourists with Typewriters (Holland and Huggan (ed), 1998)

Week 13: Week beginning October 22
Topic: Counter discourses of Travel
Reading:
Jamaica Kincaid, A Small Place

Week 14: Week beginning October 29
Topic: Post modern Itineraries
Readings:
"Post modern Itineraries" in Holland and Huggan (ed) 1998
Baudrillard, America

Assignments

Open book in -class essay
Date 24 September (during the lecture hour )
Duration 2hours
Question will be given in class

Term paper
Question:
From the first Christian pilgrimages to contemporary mass tourism, travel paradigms and traveler models have evolved continuously. How have travel literatures through the ages reflected this evolution? Illustrate your answer by drawing examples from the various excerpts and texts studied in this course.
You will find the following references helpful:
" Lecture notes on the Cultural History of Travel
" Recommended essays from Temperamental Journeys.
" Percy Adams, Travel Literature and the Evolution of the Novel. (Chapter 2)
" Percy Adams, Travel Literature Through the Ages. (for excerpts from travel narratives)
" Holland and Huggan (ed), Tourists with Typewriters ( Chapter 4)

Please limit your essay to 1250 words
Marks will be given for
a) Content and structure
b) Precision and language
c) Presentation ( footnotes, references, bibliography)

Essays should be handed in by 26 October 2001
Kindly respect the deadline given.
Electronic submissions will not be accepted
Late submissions will be penalized.

Last Modified 15 February 2002