Description
Book SynopsisThe Imprisoned Traveler is a fascinating portrait of a unique book, its context, and its elusive author. Joseph Forsyth, traveling through an Italy plundered by Napoleon, was unjustly imprisoned in 1803 by the French as an enemy alien. Out of his arduous eleven-year “detention” came his only book,
Remarks on Antiquities, Arts, and Letters during an Excursion in Italy (1813). Written as an (unsuccessful) appeal for release, praised by Forsyth’s contemporaries for its originality and fine taste, it is now recognized as a classic of Romantic period travel writing. Keith Crook, in this authoritative study, evokes the peculiar miseries that Forsyth endured in French prisons, reveals the significance of Forsyth’s encounters with scientists, poets, scholars, and ordinary Italians, and analyzes his judgments on Italian artworks. He uncovers how Forsyth’s allusiveness functions as a method of covert protest against Napoleon and reproduces the hitherto unpublished correspondence between the imprisoned Forsyth and his brother.
Published by Bucknell University Press. Distributed worldwide by Rutgers University Press.
Trade Review"[There is] value and significance of Forsyth’s travel account, and Keith Crook has provided us with an excellent
vademecum to its intricacies and, in the process, a powerful reminder of its cultural significance." * Romantic Circles *
"
The Imprisoned Traveler, which includes a series of letters he was able to send from captivity to his brother in Scotland, offers an expertly detailed tribute to the man and his work in the wider aesthetic and political contexts of Romantic Europe." * Times Literary Supplement *
"Forsyth did not get to see the second edition of his work, which saw the light thanks to his brother, for he died soon after his liberation in 1815. Crook has assumed the privileged role of updating the twenty-first-century scholarly appreciation of Forsyth's seminal account of Napoleonic Italy, and Crook's book is a must on any shelf of specialised Romantic travel writing on Italy." * The BARS Review *
"[There is] value and significance of Forsyth’s travel account, and Keith Crook has provided us with an excellent
vademecum to its intricacies and, in the process, a powerful reminder of its cultural significance." * Romantic Circles *
"
The Imprisoned Traveler, which includes a series of letters he was able to send from captivity to his brother in Scotland, offers an expertly detailed tribute to the man and his work in the wider aesthetic and political contexts of Romantic Europe." * Times Literary Supplement *
"Forsyth did not get to see the second edition of his work, which saw the light thanks to his brother, for he died soon after his liberation in 1815. Crook has assumed the privileged role of updating the twenty-first-century scholarly appreciation of Forsyth's seminal account of Napoleonic Italy, and Crook's book is a must on any shelf of specialised Romantic travel writing on Italy." * The BARS Review *
Table of ContentsList of Illustrations
Preface
List of Abbreviations
Chapter 1 The historical moment of
Forsyth’s Italy Chapter 2 Forsyth’s Prisons
Chapter 3 The 1813 and the 1816 Versions of
Forsyth’s Italy Chapter 4 Talking to Italians
Chapter 5 The Hidden Thoughts of Joseph Forsyth
Chapter 6 Visual arts, architecture, and literature
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The Letters of the Forsyth Brothers
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Appendix 1 Works of Art Forsyth Saw
Appendix 2 A Sequence for the Passages Omitted from the First Edition of
Forsyth’s Italy Acknowledgments
Bibliography
Index
