The Witness and the Other World : Exotic European Travel Writing, 400-1600 / Mary Baine Campbell.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Campbell, Mary B., 1954- author.

Contributor:

American Council of Learned Societies.

Series:

ACLS Fellows’ publications.

ACLS Humanities E-Book.

Cornell paperbacks

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Voyages and travels.

Travel in literature.

Exoticism in literature.

Travel writing--History.

Travel writing.

Difference (Psychology) in literature.

Europeans--Foreign countries--History.

Europeans.

European literature--Renaissance, 1450-1600--History and criticism.

European literature.

Literature, Medieval--History and criticism.

Literature, Medieval.

Geography, Medieval.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (x, 285 p. ) ill., maps ;

Edition:

1st print., Cornell Pbks.

Place of Publication:

Ithaca, NY : Cornell University Press, [2018]

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Surveying exotic travel writing in Europe from late antiquity to the age of discover, The Witness and the Other World illustrates the fundamental human desire to change places, if only in the imagination.Mary B. Campbell looks at works by pilgrims, crusaders, merchants, discoverers, even armchair fantasists such as Mandeville, as well as the writings of Marco Polo, Columbus, and Walter Raleigh. According to Campbell, these travel accounts are exotic because they bear witness to alienated experiences; European travelers, while claiming to relate fact, were often passing on monstrous projections. She contends that their writing not only documented but also made possible the conquest of the peoples whom she travelers described, and she shows how travel literature contributed to the genesis of the modern novel and the modern life sciences.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Part One. The East

1. The Scriptural East: Egeria, Arculf, and the Written Pilgrimage

2. The Fabulous East: "Wonder Books" and Grotesque Facts

3. The Utter East: Merchant and Missionary Travels during the "Mongol Peace"

4. "That othere half": Mandeville Naturalizes the East

Part Two. The West

5. "The end of the East": Columbus Discovers Paradise

6. "Inward Feeling": Ralegh and the Penetration of the Interior

Epilogue: A Brief History of the Future

References

Index

Notes:

Includes index.

Bibliography: p. 267-278.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 26. Mrz 2019)

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

ISBN:

9781501721090

1501721097

9780801499333

080149933X

OCLC:

1080550527