De la Mer du Nord à la Méditerranée, l’imaginaire maritime des Victoriens
From the end of the 18th century, the sea is construed in the Western imagination as the original universe, whose therapeutic virtues are being discovered. The location of the sea in question sets at the same time the property of its waters and the relationship which it offers to the body of the swi...
Saved in:
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Presses Universitaires de la Méditerranée
2017-03-01
|
| Series: | Cahiers Victoriens et Edouardiens |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://journals.openedition.org/cve/2473 |
| Tags: |
Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
| Summary: | From the end of the 18th century, the sea is construed in the Western imagination as the original universe, whose therapeutic virtues are being discovered. The location of the sea in question sets at the same time the property of its waters and the relationship which it offers to the body of the swimmers: a healthy and virile confrontation in the North, a degenerative merging in the South. This dichotomy becomes a cliché in scientific publications of the first half of the 19th century and justifies the development of British sea resorts where cold baths are prescribed to the upper classes. The second half of the century invents the Mediterranean Sea as the cradle of civilization, whereas Northern beaches are gradually given up to the middle- and then working-classes. The concomitance between these two statements suggests that it is precisely to flee resorts such as Blackpool and its working-class vacationers, that the prevailing view changes its perception of the Mediterranean Sea and discovers the charms of hedonism and of antique balneology. Late-Victorian Neoclassic art makes visually concrete an age of luxury, warm waters and sensual delight and justifies the choice of the travellers who follow Queen Victoria on the Riviera. The present article purposes to study the changing aspect of the Mediterranean Sea and her peoples in the Victorian imagination. This transformation testifies that an ideological sliding occurred during the nineteenth century, which gave up Romantic notions concerning the ethnic and territorial stability of the peoples (and the North/South dichotomy), to embrace new perspectives which envisage cross-cultural movement as a permanent feature of human history. |
|---|---|
| ISSN: | 0220-5610 2271-6149 |