Narrative

8. The influence of travel writing on the literary culture of the Romantic period can be seen in its extensive appropriation in various genres. Novelists frequently centered their plots on the motif of the journey and organized their narratives according to the conventional structure of the travelogue. Indeed, the distinction between novels and travelogues is not always easy to make, with novels resembling fictionalized travelogues and travel writers fictionalizing their journeys for narrative effect. Madame de Staël’s immensely popular Corinne; or, Italy (London: Bentley, 1833) is an example of novel that uses the trajectory and conventions of the Grand Tour narrative as a plot device.

Linda Van Netten, University of Alberta, 2013