The Cambridge Companion to American Travel Writing (Cambridge Companions to Literature) [Paperback]

Alfred Bendixen (Editor), Judith Hamera (Editor)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0521678315 | ISBN-13: 978-0521678315 | Publication Date: February 9, 2009 | Edition: 1

Travel writing has always been intimately linked with the construction of American identity. Occupying the space between fact and fiction, it exposes cultural fault lines and reveals the changing desires and anxieties of both the traveller and the reading public. These specially-commissioned essays trace the journeys taken by writers from the pre-revolutionary period right up to the present. They examine a wide range of responses to the problems posed by landscapes found both at home and abroad, from the Mississippi and the Southwest to Europe and the Holy Land. Throughout, the contributors focus on the role played by travel writing in the definition and formulation of national identity, and consider the experiences of minority writers as well as canonical authors. This Companion forms an invaluable guide for students approaching this new, important and exciting subject for the first time.

Editorial Reviews

Review

'This is a stimulating and informative work that covers much new ground: it has certainly got me thinking and I now have a long list of titles to seek out. Apart from the book's value to literature and travel studies, students of North American history will also find this book useful.' Bob Duckett, bibliographer and former reference librarian, Bradford, UK

Book Description

Travel writing has always been intimately linked with the construction of American identity. These specially-commissioned essays trace the journeys taken by writers from the pre-revolutionary period right up to the present. This Companion forms an invaluable guide for students approaching this new, important and exciting subject for the first time.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 314 pages
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press; 1 edition (February 9, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0521678315
• ISBN-13: 978-0521678315
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.9 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,391,160 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Dr Thomas Ruys Smith is a Lecturer in American Literature and Culture at the University of East Anglia. He is the author of Southern Queen: New Orleans in the Nineteenth Century (Continuum, 2011), River of Dreams: Imagining the Mississippi Before Mark Twain (Louisiana State University Press, 2007), editor of Blacklegs, Card Sharps and Confidence Men: Nineteenth-Century Mississippi River Gambling Stories (LSUP, 2010), and co-editor, with Sarah Churchwell, of Must Read: Rediscovering American Bestsellers, from Charlotte Temple to The Da Vinci Code (Continuum, 2012).