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''Letters Written During a Short Residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark'' (1796) is a personal travel narrative by the eighteenth-century British feminist writer Mary Wollstonecraft. The twenty-five letters cover a wide range of topics, from sociological reflections on Scandinavia and its peoples to philosophical questions regarding identity. Published by Wollstonecraft's career-long publisher, Joseph Johnson, it was the last work issued during her lifetime. Wollstonecraft undertook her tour of Sweden, Norway, and Denmark in order to retrieve a stolen treasure ship for her lover, Gilbert Imlay. Believing that the journey would restore their strained relationship, she eagerly set off. However, over the course of the three months she spent in Scandinavia, she realized that Imlay had no intention of renewing the relationship. The letters, which constitute the text, drawn from her journal and from missives she sent to Imlay, reflect her anger and melancholy over his repeated betrayals. ''Letters Written in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark'' is therefore both a travel narrative and an autobiographical memoir. Using the rhetoric of the sublime, Wollstonecraft explores the relationship between self and society in the text. She values subjective experience, particularly in relation to nature; champions the liberation and education of women; and illustrates the detrimental effects of commerce on society. ''Letters Written in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark'' was Wollstonecraft's most popular book in the 1790s—it sold well and was reviewed favorably by most critics. Wollstonecraft's future husband, philosopher William Godwin, wrote: "If ever there was a book calculated to make a man in love with its author, this appears to me to be the book."〔Godwin, 95.〕 It influenced Romantic poets such as William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, who drew on its themes and its aesthetic. While the book initially inspired readers to travel to Scandinavia, it failed to retain its popularity after the publication of Godwin's ''Memoirs of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman'' in 1798, which revealed Wollstonecraft's unorthodox private life. ==Biographical background== In 1790, at the age of thirty-one, Wollstonecraft made a dramatic entrance onto the public stage with ''A Vindication of the Rights of Men'', a work that helped propel the British pamphlet war over the French revolution. Two years later she published what has become her most famous work, ''A Vindication of the Rights of Woman''. Anxious to see the revolution firsthand, she moved to France for about two years, but returned in 1795 after revolutionary violence increased and the lover she met there, American adventurer Gilbert Imlay, abandoned her and their illegitimate daughter, Fanny Imlay. Shortly after her return to Britain, Wollstonecraft attempted suicide in May; Imlay, however, managed to save her. One month after her attempted suicide, Wollstonecraft agreed to undertake the long and treacherous journey to Scandinavia in order to resolve Imlay's business difficulties. Not only was her journey to Scandinavia fraught with peril (she was a woman travelling alone during a time of war), it was also laced with sorrow and anger. While Wollstonecraft initially believed that the trip might resurrect their relationship, she eventually recognized that it was doomed, particularly after Imlay failed to meet her in Hamburg.〔Jacobus, 64; 68; Holmes, 18.〕 Wollstonecraft's despair increased as her journey progressed. On her return to Britain in September, Wollstonecraft tried to commit suicide a second time: she attempted to drown herself in the River Thames but was rescued by passersby.〔Jacobus, 64.〕 ''Letters Written in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark'', which draws its material from her journal and the letters she sent Imlay during the three-month tour, was published in by Wollstonecraft's close friend and career-long publisher, Joseph Johnson. Written after her two suicide attempts, ''Letters Written in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark'' frequently returns to the topic of death; it recreates Wollstonecraft's mental state while she was in Scandinavia and has been described as a suicide note addressed to Imlay, although he is never referred to by name in the published text.〔Swaab, 19.〕 It is the last work by Wollstonecraft published within her lifetime: she died in childbirth just one year later. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Letters Written in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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