Overview
Accounts of travel to far-flung places have deservedly gripped the imagination of readers for centuries. Yet travelogues can reveal much more than the customs of a foreign land; they can also serve as a window into the culture and concerns of their place of origin. Drawing on a series of travel narratives by Iranian visitors to Europe in the nineteenth century, Taken for Wonder illustrates how these writings reflect the complicated political agendas of diplomats, merchants, kings, and others during the Qajar Dynasty.Using texts that correspond to four monarchic reigns in this period, the book shifts the traditional framework of analysis from the act of travel to that of writing travel. Hayratnamah (The Book of Wonder), an Iranian ambassador's account of his visit to the court of King George III, provides the first example. Sohrabi's reading reveals a narrative calculated to reinforce the grandeur and stability of the Qajars to its Persian readers rather than merely recount the lifestyle of the English court. Similarly, the political motives at work in Mirza Fattah Khan Garmrudi's accounts of his European journey are explored in light of Britain's 1837 occupation of Iran. A subsequent chapter considers the ways Nasir al-Din Shah, the longest reigning Qajar monarch, viewed his European travelogues as a tool for domestic politics and international diplomacy. The study concludes with two travel accounts by non-government officials, demonstrating how the genre became a mode for critiquing the Qajar Dynasty and instigating political reform at the close of the nineteenth century.
Full Product Details
Author: Naghmeh Sohrabi (Lecturer in History, Lecturer in History, Brandeis University)
Publisher: Oxford University Press Inc
Imprint: Oxford University Press Inc
Dimensions:
Width: 15.70cm
, Height: 2.00cm
, Length: 23.60cm
Weight: 0.376kg
ISBN: 9780199829705
ISBN 10: 0199829705
Pages: 192
Publication Date: 31 May 2012
Audience:
College/higher education
,
Postgraduate, Research & Scholarly
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active
Availability: To order
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Reviews
Long neglected both as a literary genre and as a rich source of historical information, Persian travel literature is just beginning to attract the critical and analytical attention it has always deserved. With its sophisticated theoretical anchoring and its nuanced discussion of nineteenth-century Iranian travelogues, Taken for Wonder stands to give rise to a new understanding of the part that this uniquely important type of writing has played in processes of contact, cross-fertilization, and modeling that keeps cultures in constant back and forth glances. --Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak, University of Maryland
"""Long neglected both as a literary genre and as a rich source of historical information, Persian travel literature is just beginning to attract the critical and analytical attention it has always deserved. With its sophisticated theoretical anchoring and its nuanced discussion of nineteenth-century Iranian travelogues, Taken for Wonder stands to give rise to a new understanding of the part that this uniquely important type of writing has played in processes of contact, cross-fertilization, and modeling that keeps cultures in constant back and forth glances."" --Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak, University of Maryland"
<br> Long neglected both as a literary genre and as a rich source of historical information, Persian travel literature is just beginning to attract the critical and analytical attention it has always deserved. With its sophisticated theoretical anchoring and its nuanced discussion of nineteenth-century Iranian travelogues, Taken for Wonder stands to give rise to a new understanding of the part that this uniquely important type of writing has played in processes of contact, cross-fertilization, and modeling that keeps cultures in constant back and forth glances. --Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak, University of Maryland<p><br>
Author Information
Naghmeh Sohrabi is Associate Director for Research at Brandeis University's Crown Center for Middle East Studies.
