Veronika Faktorová
Against Social and Literary Conventions. Ida Pfeiffer on Her Journey to the Holy Land and Egypt
This study presents Ida Laura Pfeiffer, an exceptional Austrian traveller who made several independent journeys during the 1840s and 1850s, including two round-the-world expeditions, becoming one of the most popular travel writers of her time. The study focuses on her first expedition and the travelogue she wrote about it, which was published under the title Reise einer Wienerin in das Heilige Land (1844). Her work substantially enriched the numerically significant body of European Orient-focused travelogues, and also followed other canonical models of contemporary travel literature - the study analyses in depth the relationship of the text to the concept of picturesque travel account, depicting a voyage down a historically significant river (the Danube) that flows through a charming landscape. The study shows that Ida Pfeiffer as an author follows a strong literary tradition, but at the same time she disrupts it in many ways. Her female perspective transforms stereotypical representations and also brings a different way of writing that puts the author at odds with both social and literary conventions of the time.
Keywords: female writers - female travelling - travelogue - Egypt - Holy Land - Danube
design by Bedřich Vémola
