Americans in Stratford-upon-Avon, 1785-1914literary tourism and cultural diplomacy

Abstract

This dissertation explores the presence and influence of American tourists in the hometown of William Shakespeare, Stratford-upon-Avon (United Kingdom) in order to determine the extent and importance of their participation in the development of literary tourism and the substructures of cultural diplomacy. Furthermore, the thesis explore the role played by American tourists in the rapprochement experimented by Britain and the US in the late nineteenth century that led to their becoming economic and military allies during First World War. The thesis is part of a current area of research in Shakespearean studies: the cultural myth of Shakespeare as a global phenomenon and the reception of Shakespeare outside the British world. The thesis proposes an original theme of study that combines literary tourism and cultural diplomacy as models for approaching the reception of Shakespeare in American culture. This dissertation will therefore study the "afterlives" or reception of Shakespeare with the model of analysis developed by Schoenbaum, Taylor and Bate and currently implemented by a large number of Shakespearean critics worldwide. Specifically, the thesis will use the methodology of British cultural materialism (Holderness, Dobson) and studies of high culture versus popular culture (Levine, Lanier). Studies of literary tourism and cultural diplomacy are recent; the literature on this field is scarce. The starting point in any study of literary tourism is the work carried out by Nicola Watson, The Literary Tourist (2006), and Literary Tourism and Nineteenth-Century Culture (2009). Cultural diplomacy has been discussed by Melanie Hall and Erik Goldstein in their article on "Writers, the Clergy, and the 'Diplomatization' of Culture Sub-Structures of Anglo-American Diplomacy, 1820-1914," and the article published by Clara Calvo "Shakespeare's Church and the Pilgrim Fathers: Commemorating Plymouth Rock in Stratford," examines the ideological implications of commemorative monuments in Stratford. This study is structured into four chapters. Chapter I offers an overview of the development of the Shakespeare industry in Stratford and the formation of a cult of literary tourism around Stratford, with the case study of, the Spanish writer Benito Pérez Galdós. It also introduces the notion of cultural diplomacy and suggests how it interacts with literary tourism. Chapter II is dedicated to a discussion of the intervention of American citizens on the heritage and sites of memory associated with Shakespeare in the town of Stratford, some of which were promoted and sponsored by Americans. Chapter III analyses the travel narratives of American tourists and constitutes a preliminary study for the annotated anthology of travel writing in Chapter IV. The anthology of these texts has given rise to a detailed and contextualized analysis whose main conclusions are: a) Stratford is for Americans an idyllic place associated with "Merry England". A necessary stop on the tour European, a holy place of literary pilgrimage. b) Stratford is equivalent for American travellers to the return of Shakespeare himself to Stratford: for many wealthy Americans who visit Shakespeare's home, his visit constitutes a return to the paternal home to their origins. C) Stratford is America for Americans, since Shakespeare belongs to the United States and its revolutionary values. Many Americans have contributed to renovating and improving the artistic and cultural heritage associated with Shakespeare in the city. d) Stratford is the city of Shakespeare but also the city of an American writer, Washington Irving, which Americans celebrate and commemorate at the Red Horse Inn.