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Abstract

George Sand’s travelogue published in 1841 under the title Un hiver à Majorque is now a classic of travel literature. The reader’s interest is often focused on the use of the report as a source of biographical information - not so much about the trip to Majorca as about the author’s love affair with Chopin. The present article focuses on Un hiver à Majorque as a structure of literary works, which is to be analysed with regard to the author’s treatment of the literary conventions of the French travelogue in the nineteenth century. We begin by summarising the status and orientation of the research on women’s travels. As a basis for the analysis of the text, the cultural conditions of travel and women’s writing in the 19th century and the parameters of women’s travel writing that depend on them are sketched out. In a second step, the romantic image of Spain, which shaped the imagination of French travellers and readers, is sketched out during George Sand’s departure for Majorca. In order to allow a first classification of the author and the text in the context of the tradition of literary travelogues in the nineteenth century, we need to explain the relationship between the journey and the writing of the author George Sand, as well as the more precise circumstances of the editing and publication of the travelogue and we will present the reception of the narrative by contemporary critics. Focusing on textual analysis, we will begin with the stylisation of the travel writer. The textual conception of external cultural perception is then examined, from the foreign inner world to the foreign outer world, in which the representation of nature and landscape will be compared to the representation of culture and people. The topic of civilisation and progress in George Sand’s travelogue will finally complete the text analysis. In the context of the text analysis, the practice of writing about women’s travel is to be determined more precisely by George Sand. On the one hand, the tension between the male narrator and the female subjectivity and, on the other hand, the overall textual arrangement will be examined.

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