Contained in:
Book Chapter

Italy and George Gissing: A Geocritical Approach

  • Luigi Gussago

Victorian novelist George Gissing (1857-1903) was a devotee of ancient Roman culture and visited Italy three times between 1888 and 1897. In spite of this admiration, his relationship with Italy was problematic, largely due to personal mishaps. In light of these conflicting views, my essay considers Gissing’s portrayals of mostly Southern Italian locations through his fiction, letters, and travelogues. The focus lies here not so much on the narrator but on the narrated space, with Bertrand Westphal’s notion of “geocriticism” at its theoretical core. Far from being a utopian haven, Gissing’s Italy emerges as a trans-cultural meeting point where the perception of an “interiorised place” can reshape reality, alter horizons, and redefine established values.

  • Keywords:
  • Geocriticism,
  • Gissing,
  • Place,
  • Spatiotemporality,
  • Westphal,
+ Show More

Luigi Gussago

La Trobe University, Australia - ORCID: 0000-0002-2448-3743

  1. Anonymous. 2021. “Notes and News.” The Gissing Journal 55, 4: 40-41.
  2. Bakhtin, Mikhail Mikhaĭlovich. 1981. The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays, edited by Michael Holquis, translated by Carly Emerson, Michael Holquist. Austin: University of Texas Press.
  3. Bakhtin, Mikhail Mikhaĭlovich. 2012. Sobranie sočinenij, T. 3, Teorija romana (1930-1961), edited by S.G. Bocharov, V.V. Kozhinov. Moskva: Yazyki Slavyanskikh Kultur.
  4. Coustillas, Pierre, and Colin Partridge, edited by. 1995. George Gissing: The Critical Heritage. London-New York: Routledge.
  5. Findlater, Jane H. 1904. “The Spokesman of Despair.” The Living Age, volume CCXLIII, 733-741. Boston: The Living Age Company. Reprinted in Pierre Coustillas, and Colin Partridge, edited by. 1995. George Gissing: The Critical Heritage, 456-466. London-New York: Routledge.
  6. Gissing, George. 1931 (1927). Letters of George Gissing to Members of His Family, compiled by Algernon Gissing, and Ellen Gissing. London: Constable & Company Ltd.
  7. Gissing, George. 1968 (1884). The Unclassed. New York: AMS Press.
  8. Gissing, George. 1985 (1890). The Emancipated. London: The Hogarth Press.
  9. Gissing, George. 1992. The Collected Letters of George Gissing, 3 (1886-1888), edited by Paul F. Mattheisen, Arthur C. Young, and Pierre Coustillas. Athens: Ohio University Press.
  10. Gissing, George. 1993. The Collected Letters of George Gissing, 4 (1889-1891), edited by Paul F. Mattheisen, Arthur C. Young, and Pierre Coustillas. Athens, Ohio University Press.
  11. Gissing, George. 1995. The Collected Letters of George Gissing, 7 (1897-1899), edited by Paul F. Mattheisen, Arthur C. Young, and Pierre Coustillas. Athens: Ohio University Press.
  12. Gissing, George. 1996 (1901). By the Ionian Sea. Marlboro: The Marlboro Press.
  13. Hutcheon, Rebecca. 2021. “Mapping Gissing’s Chronotopes from Text to Code to Graph.” The Gissing Journal 55, 4: 22-40.
  14. Orwell, George. 1943. “ ‘Not Enough Money’. A Sketch of George Gissing.” Tribune, 2 April, 1943.
  15. Orwell, George. 1960. “George Gissing.” London Magazine 7, 6: 36-43.
  16. Roberts, Morley. 1912. The Private Life of Henry Maitland. A Record Dictated by J.H. London: Eveleigh Nash.
  17. Schank Daley, Norma L. 1942. “Some reflections on the Scholarship of George Gissing.” The Classical Journal 38, 1: 21-30.
  18. Swinnerton, Frank. 1912. George Gissing: A Critical Study. London: Martin Secker.
  19. Tally, Robert T. Jr. 2011. “Translator’s Preface. The Timely Emergence of Geocriticism.” In Bertrand Westphal. Geocriticism: Real and Fictional Spaces, translated by Robert T. Tally Jr, ix-xiii. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
  20. Tuan, Yi-Fu. 2002 (1977). Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience. Minneapolis-London: University of Minnesota Press.
  21. Wells Herbert G. 1904. “George Gissing: An Impression.” Eclectic Magazine of Foreign Literature, Science, and Art 143, 5: 580-587. First appeared in Monthly Review 16, 47: 160-172, 1904.
  22. Westphal, Bertrand. 2000. “Pour une approche géocritique des textes.” in La Géocritique mode d’emploi, sous la direction de Bertrand Westphal, 9-40. Limoges: PULIM. https://sflgc.org/bibliotheque/westphal-bertrand-pour-une-approche-geocritique-des-textes/
  23. Westphal, Bertrand. 2007. La Géocritique: réel, fiction, espace. Paris: Minuit.
  24. Westphal, Bertrand. 2008. “Oltre la torre d’avorio. Genesi della geocritica.” In Lezioni di dottorato 2007, a cura di Roberto Baronti Marchiò, 257-271. Santa Maria Capua Vetere: Edizioni Spartaco.
  25. Westphal, Bertrand. 2011a. Geocriticism: Real and Fictional Spaces, translated by Robert T. Tally Jr. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
  26. Westphal, Bertrand. 2011b. “Spazio, luogo, frontiera. Dante e l’orizzonte.” Between 1, 1: 1-13.
PDF
  • Publication Year: 2022
  • Pages: 113-127
  • Content License: CC BY 4.0
  • © 2022 Author(s)

XML
  • Publication Year: 2022
  • Content License: CC BY 4.0
  • © 2022 Author(s)

Chapter Information

Chapter Title

Italy and George Gissing: A Geocritical Approach

Authors

Luigi Gussago

Language

English

DOI

10.36253/978-88-5518-597-4.10

Peer Reviewed

Publication Year

2022

Copyright Information

© 2022 Author(s)

Content License

CC BY 4.0

Metadata License

CC0 1.0

Bibliographic Information

Book Title

Rewriting and Rereading the XIX and XX-Century Canons

Book Subtitle

Offerings for Annamaria Pagliaro

Editors

Samuele Grassi, Brian Zuccala

Peer Reviewed

Publication Year

2022

Copyright Information

© 2022 Author(s)

Content License

CC BY 4.0

Metadata License

CC0 1.0

Publisher Name

Firenze University Press

DOI

10.36253/978-88-5518-597-4

eISBN (pdf)

978-88-5518-597-4

eISBN (xml)

978-88-5518-598-1

Series Title

Biblioteca di Studi di Filologia Moderna

Series E-ISSN

2420-8361

259

Fulltext
downloads

227

Views

Export Citation

1,346

Open Access Books

in the Catalogue

2,262

Book Chapters

3,790,127

Fulltext
downloads

4,420

Authors

from 923 Research Institutions

of 65 Nations

65

scientific boards

from 348 Research Institutions

of 43 Nations

1,248

Referees

from 381 Research Institutions

of 38 Nations