LOTI’S TRIP TO JAPAN – ACROSS THE SEA ITINERARIES

Abstract

Among all the Far East countries where he wandered – China, Korea, and Japan – the latter was the most incredible and the one that had the greatest impact on Pierre Loti. He devoted three novels to it: Madame Chrysanthème (1887), Japoneries d’automne (1889), and La troisième jeunesse de madame Prune (1905). His comments, similar to those of his contemporary Lafcadio Hearn, are a clear proof of his sociological, tourist, and ethnological knowledge of Japan, which helped forge a peculiar view of the Land of the Rising Sun. Consequently, they deserve very special consideration. This is why this study will organize itself around the objective of showing those peculiar characteristics of Japan described by Loti in his works, and of deciphering the value of his specific vision of the country, after tracing and describing his travel itineraries from which he extracted these images.