Writing between Borders on the Screen: The Cinematic Adaptations of Travel Literature

Abstract

This thesis analyses the geopolitical and cultural interactions around which Western writers have built their travelling narratives. In their accounts of crossing territorial borders to explore foreign lands, these novelists have come to treat the native inhabitants as the subjects of colonial agency, comparing their relatively different lifestyles to those of their own local birthplace. At the same time, the efforts poured into their informative descriptions about the visited destinations, combined with the fictional attributes of their stories, serve as examples of alibis for casting a series of personal judgments and criticism over such cultures. While cushioning their audience’s scrutiny and accusations of cultural, political, and racial disparagements by dissimulating their thoughts into figments of their imagination, these writers explore even the sacred depths of African, Eastern, and Middle Eastern landmarks. Taking an interest in such efforts, this research aims to assess how genuine and effective their strategies of objective portrayal appear to the continuously evolving generations of readers and critics. This interest also extends to the cinematic adaptations that aim to convey such a multitude of intercultural stories into an audio-visual medium.