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Literary Criticism General

Marco Polo and the Encounter of East and West

by (author) Suzanne Conklin Akbari & Amilcare Iannucci

Publisher
University of Toronto Press
Initial publish date
Dec 2008
Category
General
  • Hardback

    ISBN
    9780802099280
    Publish Date
    Dec 2008
    List Price
    $91.00
  • eBook

    ISBN
    9781442693289
    Publish Date
    Dec 2008
    List Price
    $76.00

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Description

Few figures from history evoke such vivid Orientalist associations as Marco Polo, the Venetian merchant, explorer, and writer whose accounts of the "Far East" sparked literary and cultural imaginations. The essays in Marco Polo and the Encounter of East and West challenge what many scholars perceived to be an opposition of "East" and "West" in Polo's writings. These writers argue that Marco Polo's experiences along the Silk Road should instead be considered a fertile interaction of cultural exchange.

The volume begins with detailed studies of Marco Polo's narrative in its many medieval forms (including French, Italian, and Latin versions). They place the text in its material and generic contexts, and situate Marco Polo's account within the conventions of travel literature and manuscript illumination. Other essays consider the appropriation of Marco Polo's narrative in adaptations, translation, and cinematic art. The concluding section presents historiographic and poetic accounts of the place of Marco Polo in the context of a global world literature.

By considering the production and reception of The Travels, this collection lays the groundwork for new histories of world literature written from the perspective of cultural, economic, and linguistic exchange, rather than conquest and conflict.

About the authors

Suzanne Conklin Akbari is a professor in the Department of English and the Centre for Medieval Studies at the University of Toronto.

Suzanne Conklin Akbari's profile page

The late Amilcare Iannucci was a professor in the Department of Italian Studies and the Centre for Comparative Literature at the University of Toronto. He was the author of a book on Dante, Forma ed evento nella Divina Commedia, and editor of Dante Today>.

Amilcare Iannucci's profile page

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