THREE EXOTIC VIEWS OF SOUTHEAST ASIA:
The Travel Narratives of Isabella Bird, Max Dauthendey, and Ai Wu, 1850-1930
Maria Noëlle Ng
This critical study of
three intrepid travelers to Southeast Asia—Bird (1831–1904), Dauthendey
(1867–1918), Wu (1904–1992)—combines detailed analysis of travel literature
with carefully researched historical background and argues that any travel
narrative is inevitably a product of the traveler’s own cultural and social
background. Thus travel narrative is never an objective account—the reader must
take into consideration the traveler’s own history. By juxtaposing the views of
a Chinese with those of two Western travelers, this book shows that prejudice
and racism can exist in both the West and the East.
In
choosing a Victorian traveler, a German poet, and a Chinese writer, Ng’s study
encompasses a geographical area that includes Britain, Germany, China, as well
as Southeast Asia and an historical span from the Victorian era to the
twentieth century. Three Exotic Views of
Southeast Asia is theoretically informed by postcolonial and poststructural
criticism. But it also details particular historical contexts, thus evoking the
glamour and magic of traveling in a bygone era.
Apart
from an examination of a broad range of literature by, among many others, Henry
Mayhew, Somerset Maugham, Thomas Mann, and Ba Jin, this groundbreaking study
also discusses architecture, fine arts, philanthropic culture, and the rise of
mass tourism. Original translations from the German and the Chinese are by the
author.
CONTENTS
Introduction
Isabella Bird in Southeast
Asia: 1851: A Glass House / Mayhew’s Exotic Poor / A
Benevolent Lady of Leisure in Southeast Asia / The Hierarchy of Non-Europeans /
In Southeast Asia and Canton with No Baedeker
Max Dauthendey Seduced by
the Tropics: Berlin Fin-de-Siècle / The Orient in Nineteenth-Century
Germany / The Blue Light of the Exotic East / “A Wanderer Upon the Face of
Public Resort”
Ai Wu Learning How to
Curse: Chinese and Dogs Not Allowed: The Milk of the May Fourth
Movement / Life as a Sahib or a Dog in Burma / Invocations of China Abroad / We
Are Not One Big Happy Family
Conclusion
Maria Noëlle Ng was born in Macau and grew up in Hong Kong. She
received her Ph.D. in Comparative Literature at the University of British
Columbia. Her special research areas are nineteenth-century English and German
studies, Modern Chinese and Chinese Canadian writing, and colonial and
postcolonial cultures. She is Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation Assistant Professor
of Comparative Literature, Religion, Film/Media Studies, University of Alberta.
EastBridge Signature
Books 2002 212 pp
ISBN 1-891936-05-0 (pb) $29.95
ISBN 1-891936-18-2 (hb) $49.95