American Writers and the Picturesque Tour: The Search for National Identity, 1790-1860 / Edition 1

by Beth L. Lueck

Overview

Explores a beloved genre
Even before the age of the Romantics, travel literature was a favorite genre of English and American writers and readers. After the War of 1812, Americans' passion for scenic beauty inspired them to take the picturesque tour of America as well as going to Europe for the requisite Grand Tour. The written American version of the popular British tour in various guidebooks helped shape the literature of the new nation as nearly every major writer of the first half of the 19th century contributed to it from Poe, who provided several comic pieces, and Irving to Thoreau, for whom the tour symbolized moral and spiritual growth, and Margaret Fuller.

Offers new perspectives
American writers adapted the picturesque to express their nationalistic sentiments; picturesque discourse offered a flexible series of conventions that enable writers to celebrate the places, people, and legends that set America apart. This volume demonstrates the vital role of this genre in the formation of national literary taste and national culture and offers fresh and exciting perspectives on the topic. Includes index. Also includes maps.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780815322856
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	08/01/1997
Series:	Garland Studies in 19th Century American Literature , #7
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	226
Product dimensions:	5.44(w) x 8.50(h) x (d)

Table of Contents

Introduction * Charles Brockden Brown's Edgar Huntly: The Picturesque Traveler as Sleepwalker * Banqueting on the Picturesque: James Kirke Paulding in the 1820s and '30s * The Search for Manliness: Irving and Parkman in the West * Hawthorne's Ironic Traveler * Poe's Picturesque-Hunters * Excursions in New England: Thoreau as Picturesque Tourist * Conclusion

Editorial Reviews

A critical survey of the picturesque tour in national literature from Charles Brockden Brown to writers of the American Renaissance, detailing how American writers' attitudes toward this European aesthetic shaped their creation of an American literary nationalism. Contains chapters on Brown's "Edgar Huntly", Hawthorne's ironic traveler, Poe's picturesque-hunters, and Thoreau as picturesque tourist. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

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