“Under the influence of an exotic nature...national remembrances are insensibly effaced”
- My essay attends to a number of passages in Alexander von Humboldt’s Personal Narrative in which the Prussian explorer expresses anxiety about the apparent dangers posed by the overwhelmingly productive tropical landscapes he observes. In these passages, the excesses of an “exotic nature” threaten European identity and modes of civilization—and they trouble the accuracy of Humboldt’s own observational project. I also explore Humboldt’s related worry that South American vegetable (and visual) overload will exert a destabilizing effect on his aesthetic sensibility, disrupting his ability to represent the “New Continent” accurately in writing. Finally, I sketch the influence of Humboldt’s representations of tropical excess on nineteenth-century British cultural thought and literary practice. Studying the instabilities experienced by Personal Narrative’s expatriates and colonists promises to draw out important tensions latent in Humboldt’s treatment of tropical landscape and to illuminate broader epistemological and aesthetic shifts beingMy essay attends to a number of passages in Alexander von Humboldt’s Personal Narrative in which the Prussian explorer expresses anxiety about the apparent dangers posed by the overwhelmingly productive tropical landscapes he observes. In these passages, the excesses of an “exotic nature” threaten European identity and modes of civilization—and they trouble the accuracy of Humboldt’s own observational project. I also explore Humboldt’s related worry that South American vegetable (and visual) overload will exert a destabilizing effect on his aesthetic sensibility, disrupting his ability to represent the “New Continent” accurately in writing. Finally, I sketch the influence of Humboldt’s representations of tropical excess on nineteenth-century British cultural thought and literary practice. Studying the instabilities experienced by Personal Narrative’s expatriates and colonists promises to draw out important tensions latent in Humboldt’s treatment of tropical landscape and to illuminate broader epistemological and aesthetic shifts being worked out during the period.…
Verfasserangaben: | Jason H. Lindquist |
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URN: | urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus-35109 |
ISSN: | 2568-3543 |
ISSN: | 1617-5239 |
Titel des übergeordneten Werks (Deutsch): | HIN : Alexander von Humboldt im Netz ; international review for Humboldtian studies |
Untertitel (Englisch): | Threats to the European subject in Humboldt’s personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent |
Verlag: | Universitätsverlag Potsdam |
Verlagsort: | Potsdam |
Publikationstyp: | Wissenschaftlicher Artikel |
Sprache: | Englisch |
Erscheinungsjahr: | 2004 |
Veröffentlichende Institution: | Universität Potsdam |
Veröffentlichende Institution: | Universitätsverlag Potsdam |
Datum der Freischaltung: | 04.09.2009 |
Freies Schlagwort / Tag: | 1799-1804; Europa Relation historique |
Band: | V |
Ausgabe: | 9 |
Seitenanzahl: | 16 |
Erste Seite: | 44 |
Letzte Seite: | 59 |
Quelle: | HiN : Alexander von Humboldt im Netz, V (2004) 9 |
RVK - Regensburger Verbundklassifikation: | GK 4953, NU 5089, WB 3187, RT 10026, RB 10032 |
Organisationseinheiten: | Philosophische Fakultät / Institut für Romanistik |
DDC-Klassifikation: | 5 Naturwissenschaften und Mathematik / 50 Naturwissenschaften / 509 Histor., geogr., personenbezogene Behandlung |
9 Geschichte und Geografie / 91 Geografie, Reisen / 911 Historische Geografie | |
Sammlung(en): | Universität Potsdam / Zeitschriften / HiN : Alexander von Humboldt im Netz ; International Review for Humboldtian Studies, ISSN 1617-5239 / HiN V, 9 (2004) |
Peer Review: | Referiert |
Publikationsweg: | Universitätsverlag Potsdam |
Lizenz (Deutsch): | CC-BY-NC - Namensnennung, nicht kommerziell 4.0 International |
Externe Anmerkung: | The original publication is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.18443/52 |