travel text presentations
[updated 4/21 to add Emily and Amir]
Amir: While all the detailed economic and diplomatic information is...interesting (ok, long) what interested me the most was the inclusion of letters from (and to? I'm not sure—I only saw one volume) the King of Siam. I know there's an excerpt from Bowring to the King at least typed in the volume if not reprinted in facsimile version (because you quoted from it), but I was interested to see the letter from the King, written in perfect English script (must have had a good scribe?) but with the King's stamp on it. I wonder why he included that particular one? It couldn't have been the only letter from the King. Maybe he wanted to show that at one point they did have a good diplomatic relationship? Before he went off and started a war, that is.
Emily: All the stuff you pointed out about Robbins's descriptions of the "savages" (calling them that/assuming they were going to eat him before he even met them, just looking at them from afar) is quite interesting and your observations spot on. Of course one of the most interesting things about this "journal" is that it was written by a white man enslaved during the height of slavery in his own country. But what is even more interesting is the popularity of this little book, especially since, as you said, the captain produced his own book. Even the MASC copy, which is from 1818 and within the first year it was in print, is a 4th edition. There seem to be at least ten different editions (let alone printings of the editions) in the nineteenth century alone. Intriguing. I wonder what types of people were reading it/making it so popular.
[original from 4/6]
Kellan: From what I recall, this was the first of the travel texts presented that was expressly published under the authority of the East India Company. To that end, I think the things you highlighted in the text were just those things that the text was supposed to show: "the state of agriculture, arts, and commerce; the religion manners and customs; the history natural and civil, and antiquities, in the dominions of the rajah of Mysore, and the countries acquired by the Honourable East India Company." In a text like this, I wouldn't expect a Romantic hero, or any sort of objectivity. Instead, I would expect to catch the subtext "what can we [the EIC] get from this land, these people" and be presented with sheets upon sheets of data. This might be the first of the texts presented that is just what it seems to be/was intended to be.
Hillary: I think there's definitely an article or conference presentation in here regarding the on-board entertainment of the literary variety (the newspaper, the plays). It would be interesting, I think, to look at the themes of what was being written on-board—stuff about what they're seeing/experiencing while being stuck on the ship, or things that they don't see (things they miss from home, for instance).
Toria: In contemporary reviews of other Dicey works, his books are often said to be "gentlemanly." I'm not sure what that means, but it might be something like what you wrote in your handout—that "his style is more humorous than scientifically focused." I'm thinking his narrative is the thing of cocktail parties rather than university classrooms. But that doesn't really explain why this particular text sort of dropped out of the limelight so to speak, while some of his others did not. Although he wrote a lot about the Middle East and Asia, he also wrote about America. His Spectator of America and Six Months in the Federal States were reprinted, at least in America, even as recent as the 1970s. Given he was prolific, it would be interesting to see if the works that did remain at a certain level of popularity were those which were more "gentlemanly" or those that were more scientific or ethnographic (I'm making a distinction that maybe doesn't even need to be made).
Jerry: The ruse that is this story is quite compelling stuff. Knowing that Banks was a subscriber to this text (am I remembering it correctly?) adds to the complexity of the situation—sure, the voyage was real but the story concocted (at least parts of it)...but were there any reports of value for Banks and others? Isn't any observation of a new thing, or at least something not often observed, at least a little valuable? It wasn't as if this story was completely fabricated—unlike Damberger, there wast at least a voyage to some of the places discussed in the text—so even under the cloud of suspicion and conspiracy someone (perhaps Banks) could have found something useful in the text.
Me: What still strikes me about the Burnaby text is the way in which his observations —and they were just observations and not experiments—would go on to become reference materials those writing about life in the colonies (Virginia in particular) throughout the nineteenth century. Additionally, the Burnaby text is one of those reconstructed narratives—he visited in 1759-60 but the text was written/reconstructed from notes and wasn't published until 1775. It was at that time the footnotes were added, and I don't doubt that these additions were in some part to do what Tim noted in his post: "could the footnotes in your narrative be there to help validate the narrative?" I would say so.
Amir: While all the detailed economic and diplomatic information is...interesting (ok, long) what interested me the most was the inclusion of letters from (and to? I'm not sure—I only saw one volume) the King of Siam. I know there's an excerpt from Bowring to the King at least typed in the volume if not reprinted in facsimile version (because you quoted from it), but I was interested to see the letter from the King, written in perfect English script (must have had a good scribe?) but with the King's stamp on it. I wonder why he included that particular one? It couldn't have been the only letter from the King. Maybe he wanted to show that at one point they did have a good diplomatic relationship? Before he went off and started a war, that is.
Emily: All the stuff you pointed out about Robbins's descriptions of the "savages" (calling them that/assuming they were going to eat him before he even met them, just looking at them from afar) is quite interesting and your observations spot on. Of course one of the most interesting things about this "journal" is that it was written by a white man enslaved during the height of slavery in his own country. But what is even more interesting is the popularity of this little book, especially since, as you said, the captain produced his own book. Even the MASC copy, which is from 1818 and within the first year it was in print, is a 4th edition. There seem to be at least ten different editions (let alone printings of the editions) in the nineteenth century alone. Intriguing. I wonder what types of people were reading it/making it so popular.
[original from 4/6]
Kellan: From what I recall, this was the first of the travel texts presented that was expressly published under the authority of the East India Company. To that end, I think the things you highlighted in the text were just those things that the text was supposed to show: "the state of agriculture, arts, and commerce; the religion manners and customs; the history natural and civil, and antiquities, in the dominions of the rajah of Mysore, and the countries acquired by the Honourable East India Company." In a text like this, I wouldn't expect a Romantic hero, or any sort of objectivity. Instead, I would expect to catch the subtext "what can we [the EIC] get from this land, these people" and be presented with sheets upon sheets of data. This might be the first of the texts presented that is just what it seems to be/was intended to be.
Hillary: I think there's definitely an article or conference presentation in here regarding the on-board entertainment of the literary variety (the newspaper, the plays). It would be interesting, I think, to look at the themes of what was being written on-board—stuff about what they're seeing/experiencing while being stuck on the ship, or things that they don't see (things they miss from home, for instance).
Toria: In contemporary reviews of other Dicey works, his books are often said to be "gentlemanly." I'm not sure what that means, but it might be something like what you wrote in your handout—that "his style is more humorous than scientifically focused." I'm thinking his narrative is the thing of cocktail parties rather than university classrooms. But that doesn't really explain why this particular text sort of dropped out of the limelight so to speak, while some of his others did not. Although he wrote a lot about the Middle East and Asia, he also wrote about America. His Spectator of America and Six Months in the Federal States were reprinted, at least in America, even as recent as the 1970s. Given he was prolific, it would be interesting to see if the works that did remain at a certain level of popularity were those which were more "gentlemanly" or those that were more scientific or ethnographic (I'm making a distinction that maybe doesn't even need to be made).
Jerry: The ruse that is this story is quite compelling stuff. Knowing that Banks was a subscriber to this text (am I remembering it correctly?) adds to the complexity of the situation—sure, the voyage was real but the story concocted (at least parts of it)...but were there any reports of value for Banks and others? Isn't any observation of a new thing, or at least something not often observed, at least a little valuable? It wasn't as if this story was completely fabricated—unlike Damberger, there wast at least a voyage to some of the places discussed in the text—so even under the cloud of suspicion and conspiracy someone (perhaps Banks) could have found something useful in the text.
Me: What still strikes me about the Burnaby text is the way in which his observations —and they were just observations and not experiments—would go on to become reference materials those writing about life in the colonies (Virginia in particular) throughout the nineteenth century. Additionally, the Burnaby text is one of those reconstructed narratives—he visited in 1759-60 but the text was written/reconstructed from notes and wasn't published until 1775. It was at that time the footnotes were added, and I don't doubt that these additions were in some part to do what Tim noted in his post: "could the footnotes in your narrative be there to help validate the narrative?" I would say so.
