Traveling in Place
A History of Armchair Travel
University of Chicago Press, 2013
Cloth: 978-0-226-77467-1 | Electronic: 978-0-226-08115-1
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226081151.001.0001
Cloth: 978-0-226-77467-1 | Electronic: 978-0-226-08115-1
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226081151.001.0001
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ABOUT THIS BOOKAUTHOR BIOGRAPHYREVIEWSTABLE OF CONTENTS
ABOUT THIS BOOK
Armchair travel may seem like an oxymoron. Doesn’t travel require us to leave the house? And yet, anyone who has lost herself for hours in the descriptive pages of a novel or the absorbing images of a film knows the very real feeling of having explored and experienced a different place or time without ever leaving her seat. No passport, no currency, no security screening required—the luxury of armchair travel is accessible to us all. In Traveling in Place, Bernd Stiegler celebrates this convenient, magical means of transport in all its many forms.
Organized into twenty-one “legs”—or short chapters—Traveling in Place begins with a consideration of Xavier de Maistre’s 1794 Voyage autour de ma chambre, an account of the forty-two-day “journey around his room” Maistre undertook as a way to entertain himself while under house arrest. Stiegler is fascinated by the notion of exploring the familiar as though it were completely new and strange. He engages writers as diverse as Roussel, Beckett, Perec, Robbe-Grillet, Cortázar, Kierkegaard, and Borges, all of whom show how the everyday can be brilliantly transformed. Like the best guidebooks, Traveling in Place is more interested in the idea of travel as a state of mind than as a physical activity, and Stiegler reflects on the different ways that traveling at home have manifested themselves in the modern era, from literature and film to the virtual possibilities of the Internet, blogs, and contemporary art.
Reminiscent of the pictorial meditations of Sebald, but possessed of the intellectual playfulness of Calvino, Traveling in Place offers an entertaining and creative Baedeker to journeying at home.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Bernd Stiegler is professor of twentieth-century German literature and of literature and media at the University of Konstanz. Peter Filkins is a poet and teaches literature at Bard College at Simon's Rock.
REVIEWS
“Bernd Stiegler introduces us to a history of travelogues, all written by trailblazers who measure the span of their adventures by the number of paces between the fireside armchair and the window casement. Stiegler shows the degree to which the room of the writer has become a microcosm, already stocked with enough exotic detail to place itself at the infinite disposal of our curiosity. The book suggests that no matter how far any wandering sightseer might travel, what really embarks on the trek is our imagination.”
— Christian Bök, author of Euonia“In this fascinating book, Bernd Stiegler turns modern travel inside out to offer us a history of armchair exploration. From chapter to chapter, he takes us through a rich series of modern travel narratives to convey how intricately the domestic interior and the global expanse have been interwoven. We learn a great deal about the microcosmic operations of travel as a narrative form, and about the odd delights and uncanny estrangements—for the imaginative—of staying home.”
— Robin Kelsey, Harvard University
“Bernd Stiegler’s rich snapshots of traveling in place are a long overdue addition to the history of modern travel. Here we see Robinson Crusoe in relief: not the lost soul on a far-off tropical island but the intrepid explorers of the close at hand, recounting their arduous journeys through rooms, pockets, purses, desks, and drawers. Traveling in Place is a thought-provoking Wunderkammer of small distances.”
— Andrew Piper, author of Book Was There: Reading in Electronic Times
“In this esoteric but inspiring work, Stiegler forces us to consider the beauty and uniqueness of our common abodes. . . . The locations of Stiegler’s brief chapters or ‘legs’ range from monastic cells to the artist’s studio, with authors including Samuel Beckett and Walter Benjamin. Although the reason for these travelogues ranges from sickness to boredom, they tell us more about their authors than any other genre. With unmatched uniqueness and stunning insightfulness, Stiegler gives readers of a philosophical bent noteworthy food for thought.”
— Booklist“An informative and entertaining volume that introduces the reader to a new genre of travel literature. Recommended.”
— ChoiceTABLE OF CONTENTS
Brief Travel Guide
First Leg - The Journey around the Room
Second Leg - Pilgrimages
Third Leg - The “Frauenzimmer”
Fourth Leg - Expeditions in the Near- at- Hand
Fifth Leg - Framed Views
Sixth Leg - The Life of Plants
Seventh Leg - The Life of Objects
Eighth Leg - The Journey through a Sea of Images
Ninth Leg - Dark Chambers
Tenth Leg - Interiors
Eleventh Leg- The Flaneur
Excurion and Stopover - Around the World in 80 Days
Twelfth Leg - Peregrinations
Thirteenth Leg - Travels with a Room
Fourteenth Leg - A Cinematic Baedeker
Fifteenth Leg - The Journey to La Défense
Sixteenth Leg - Journeys into the World as Text
Seventeenth Leg- The Journey into Oneself
Eighteenth Leg - Crossing- Crisscrossing
Nineteenth leg - Cinematic Explorations
Twentieth Leg - Near Distance
Twenty - First Leg - The Final Journey
Acknowledgments
Translator’s Note
Index of Names