L'Aventure humaine: spirituality, myth and power in the post-war travel narratives of Louise Weiss

Pymm, Sarah Elizabeth (2018). L'Aventure humaine: spirituality, myth and power in the post-war travel narratives of Louise Weiss. University of Birmingham. Ph.D.

Preview

Pymm18PhD.pdf
PDF
Download (6MB)

Abstract

This thesis considers the post-war œuvre of Louise Weiss through the analytical framework of the travel narrative. The primary sources for this study comprise the substantial number of previously unexamined journal articles, photographic collections, monographs, and short documentaries which Weiss wrote following her journeys throughout Asia, North America, Africa, and the Middle East in the twenty-five years after the Second World War. Previously defined by her early career as a journalist, her lifelong advocacy for peace, and her campaigns for women’s suffrage during the interwar period, this study positions Weiss in a new narrative – that of post-war travel writer with a desire to discover a moral code that would mitigate the turbulence and fragility she perceived in the twentieth century. The analysis of this considerable body of source material is approached through the themes of spirituality, myth, and power. These themes, which emerge organically from Weiss's multi-media post-war œuvre, offer a fresh perspective on the French post-war travel narrative and allow a new understanding of both the traveller’s gaze and the notion of displacement

Type of Work:

Thesis (Doctorates > Ph.D.)

Award Type:

Doctorates > Ph.D.

Supervisor(s):