Romantic Writing and Pedestrian Travel

Romantic Writing and Pedestrian Travel is an exploration of the relationship between walking and writing. Robin Jarvis here reconstructs the scene of walking, both in Britain and on the Continent, in the 1790s, and analyzes the mentality and motives of the early pedestrian traveler. He then discusses the impact of this cultural revolution on the creativity of major Romantic writers, focusing especially on William and Dorothy Wordsworth, Coleridge, Clare, Keats, Hazlitt and Hunt. In...
More Description

Romantic Writing and Pedestrian Travel is an exploration of the relationship between walking and writing. Robin Jarvis here reconstructs the scene of walking, both in Britain and on the Continent, in the 1790s, and analyzes the mentality and motives of the early pedestrian traveler. He then discusses the impact of this cultural revolution on the creativity of major Romantic writers, focusing especially on William and Dorothy Wordsworth, Coleridge, Clare, Keats, Hazlitt and Hunt. In readings which engage current debates around literature and travel, Jarvis demonstrates how walking became not only a powerful means of self-enfranchisement but also the focus of restless textual energies.