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Books > History > American history
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Passage to America - Celebrated European Visitors in Search of the American Adventure (Hardcover, New)
Loot Price: R1,671
Discovery Miles 16 710
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Passage to America - Celebrated European Visitors in Search of the American Adventure (Hardcover, New)
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America was a source of fascination to Europeans arriving there
during the course of the nineteenth century. At first glance, the
New World was very similar to the societies they left behind in
their native countries, but in many aspects of politics, culture
and society, the American experience was vastly different - almost
unrecognisably so - from Old World Europe. Europeans were astounded
that America could survive without a monarch, a standing army and
the hierarchical society which still dominated Europe. Some
travellers, such as the actress Fanny Kemble, were truly convinced
America would eventually revert to a monarchy; others, such as
Frances Wright and even Oscar Wilde, took their opinions further,
and attempted to fix aspects of America - described in 1827 by the
young Scottish captain Basil Hall, as 'one of England's "occasional
failures"'. Many prominent visitors to the United States recorded
their responses to this emerging society in their diaries, letters
and journals; and many of them, like the fulminating Frances
Trollope, were brutally and offensively honest in their accounts of
the New World. They provide an insight into an America which is
barely recognizable today whilst their writings set down a diverse
and lively assortment of personal travel accounts. This book
compares the impressions of a group of discerning and prominent
Europeans from the cultural sphere - from the writers Charles
Dickens, William Makepeace Thackeray and Oscar Wilde to luminaries
of music and theatre such as Tchaikovsky and Fanny Kemble. Their
reactions to the New World are as revealing of the European and
American worlds as they are colourful and varied, providing a
unique insight into the experiences of nineteenth century travelers
to America.
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