Transformation through Travel

The purpose of literature is to transport us, to take us out of the humdrum of everyday life out into the unknown. Modern society often attempts to glorify the ordinary, however, it is my belief that man was not built for the ordinary, but the extraordinary. In prehistoric times hunters used to return to their camps and delight their comrades with tales of adventure in the great unknown, with these stories later becoming the foundation for many of histories greatest works. Odysseus’s mystified and daring travels have fascinated the imagination for generations. As have the tales of Herodotus, Marco Polo, Ibn Battuta, Columbus, Cabeza de Vaca, and countless others.
 
Although much of the world has today been mapped, photographed, and explored, this does not preclude the possibility for contemporary adventure, although it has made it more nuanced. For the stories aforementioned are not only about physical travel, about spatially moving out into the unknown, they are also about the travelers evolving values and emotions. That is the heart of the story.
 
All life is a journey, and all great literature in essence describes a journey, either internal or external. These Journeys can take place anywhere, in the wilderness, in the city, in a middle-class suburb. The important thing is not where they occur, but the journey they reveal.  In a strict sense, much of what we have read this semester is not ‘literature’, but rather historical first hand accounts. They are not fanciful works of creative imagination - with the exception of The Odyssey and The Tempest, of course. However, they are better than most literature in so far as they do better at accomplishing the real goal of literature, capturing the journey. Cadeza de Vaca, in my mind is probably the best example of this, and serves as a rare case of a work demonstrative of both literary and historical merit.
 
I think it is often easy to pigeonhole historical works into the category of simply history, ignoring their literary merit. Many of the books we have read are so extraordinary in their historical accounts, Marco Polo and Cabeza de Vaca being key examples, that their literary merit is often brushed aside. Consigning these works simply to the history shelves, however, ignores the incredible stories of personal transformation they contain. In many of the works we have read it is not hard to see how the traveler’s views change. Marco Polo’s growing admiration for the Great Kublai Khan, Cabeza de Vaca’s growing love of the indigenous people of the Americas, and so forth. For this reason, it is my view that these works should be read more often as we have read them – as works of both incredible historical and literary merit.