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The absence of authenticity and the authenticity of absence in Robert Dessaix's Twilight of Love
Citation
Ouston, A, The absence of authenticity and the authenticity of absence in Robert Dessaix's Twilight of Love, Studies in Travel Writing, 19, (3) pp. 259-273. ISSN 1364-5145 (2015) [Refereed Article]
Copyright Statement
Copyright 2015 Taylor & Francis
DOI: doi:10.1080/13645145.2015.1074810
Abstract
This paper examines Robert Dessaix’s tourist experiences in his fifth book-length publication
Twilight of Love: Travels with Turgenev (2004). Drawing on tourism theorists John Urry and
John Frow, I suggest that Dessaix’s travel experience shifts between the self-conscious coolness
of the post-tourist and an unselfconscious, humanist quest for authenticity. I analyse these shifts
in terms of Ning Wang’s concept of "existential authenticity" which he differentiates from
objectivist, constructivist and post-modernist approaches to authenticity. Dessaix essentially
engages with, or moves playfully between, each of these modes. Ultimately, though, they
dovetail at Courtavenel, France, when he visits one of Turgenev’s former dwellings, revealing
an essential sense of absence at the centre of Dessaix’s identity, one that speaks to his absent
biological parents, his lack of a concrete genealogy, the silence that surrounded his
homosexuality in the first part of his life, and the threat of mortality that permeates Dessaix’s
work and his efforts to engage with his "true self". In this way, Dessaix’s travel experience not
only characterises his journey as a quest for existential authenticity, but it also confirms Judith
Adler’s notion of travel as an artform that is capable of articulating subjectivity.
Item Details
Item Type: | Refereed Article |
---|---|
Keywords: | Dessaix; Turgenev; tourism; “touristic shame”; Twilight of Love; France; |
Research Division: | Language, Communication and Culture |
Research Group: | Literary studies |
Research Field: | Comparative and transnational literature |
Objective Division: | Culture and Society |
Objective Group: | Communication |
Objective Field: | Literature |
UTAS Author: | Ouston, A (Mr Adam Ouston) |
ID Code: | 103675 |
Year Published: | 2015 |
Deposited By: | School of Humanities |
Deposited On: | 2015-10-26 |
Last Modified: | 2017-10-30 |
Downloads: | 0 |
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