Jens Kirk, Dept. of Languages and Culture

Textanalysis

Tekstanalysis and History

Session Seven

Travel Writing: Robert Louis Stevenson

Jens Kirk, Dept. of Languages and Culture

Textanalysis

Agenda

Summary of Session Six Travel writing and allegory Victorian travel Group Work: R. L. Stevenson, Travels with a

Donkey in the Cevenne

Jens Kirk, Dept. of Languages and Culture

Textanalysis

Summary of Session Six

Paul Fussel’s concept of displaced romance: Quest Pastoral Picaresque

Jens Kirk, Dept. of Languages and Culture

Textanalysis

Travel writing and allegory

Allegory: primary and secondary orders of signification

Travelling = living and dying (life is a journey) Travelling = reading and writing (what is

suggested about the activities of reading and writing?)

Jens Kirk, Dept. of Languages and Culture

Textanalysis

Intertextuality

Stevenson’s dedication Intertextuality and allegory John Bunyan, The Pilgrims Progress (1678)

Jens Kirk, Dept. of Languages and Culture

Textanalysis

Romantic and Victorian travel

Tourists, travellers, and explorers Ruins Landscapes

Jens Kirk, Dept. of Languages and Culture

Textanalysis

Group work: R. L. Stevenson, Travels with a Donkey in the Cevenne

Outline the uses of fictional elements: Comic novel (Does

Stevenson use comic anomalies? How and Why?)

Romance (how and why are the romance elements used?)

Quest Pastoral Picaresque

Allegory (Of reading? Of writing? Of life?)

Outline the uses of non-fictional elements Essay (is Stevenson

making a moral point?) Memoir: Do we learn

something about famous people and places?

Autobiography: Do we learn something about Stevenson’s life