A NEW IMAGE OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA IN BELGIAN TRAVELLERS’ NARRATIVES OF THE LAST DECADE OF THE 19TH CENTURY

Abstract

During the second half of the 19th century, writers, publicists, travellers, artists and journalists launched a new image of the United States as a reflection of modernity, happiness, novelty and prosperity, transmitting new forms of life closer to reason, nature and freedom. Guizot, Taine, and Tocquevillewere the inspiring force of the American authors. The literature that portrayed this new vision of the world was mainly in English, and it was quite common to find books and exhibitions about the USA, but in France and Belgium, the intermediaries of the intellectual life appeared rather tentative in the writings of new authors that evince an original and extensive use of the symbolic imagination. The aim of this study is to systematize and analyzse the bulk of literature produced in Belgium on the United States during this span of time.