Romantic Geography: In Search of the Sublime Landscape

by Yi-Fu Tuan

Geography is useful, indeed necessary, to survival. Everyone must know where to find food, water, and a place of rest, and, in the modern world, all must make an effort to make the Earth—our home—habitable. But much present-day geography lacks drama, with its maps and statistics, descriptions and analysis, but no acts of chivalry, no sense of quest. Not long ago, however, geography was romantic. Heroic explorers ventured to forbidding environments—oceans, mountains, forests, caves, deserts, polar ice caps—to test their power of endurance for reasons they couldn't fully articulate. Why climb Everest? "Because it is there."            Yi-Fu Tuan has established a global reputation for deepening the field of geography by examining its moral, universal, philosophical, and poetic potentials and implications. In his twenty-second book, Romantic Geography, he continues to engage the wide-ranging ideas that have made him one of the most influential geographers of our time. In this elegant meditation, he considers the human tendency—stronger in some cultures than in others—to veer away from the middle ground of common sense to embrace the polarized values of light and darkness, high and low, chaos and form, mind and body. In so doing, venturesome humans can find salvation in geographies that cater not so much to survival needs (or even to good, comfortable living) as to the passionate and romantic aspirations of their nature. Romantic Geography is thus a paean to the human spirit, which can lift us to the heights but also plunge us into the abyss.

Genres: Philosophy, Geography, Nonfiction, Nature, Art, History

205 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 1, 2013

About the author

Fu Tuan (Traditional Chinese: 段義孚, born 5 December 1930) is a Chinese-U.S. geographer.
Tuan was born in 1930 in Tientsin, China. He was the son of a rich oligarch and was part of the top class in the Republic of China. Tuan attended University College, London, but graduated from the University of Oxford with a B.A. and M.A. in 1951 and 1955 respectively. From there he went to California to continue his geographic education. He received his Ph.D. in 1957 from the University of California, Berkeley.

Reviews

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Compelling ideas about the human need for romance in a time when geography is increasingly about maintenance and care-taking. Examples are drawn from literature and explorers' autobiographical writings. Resonance here with prior Tuan writings such as Escapism and the Good Life. Tuan's concepts of civilization and the good are more sophisticated than they are in usual speech, and he slowly complicates their relationship with the romantic until we get a nuanced humanistic understanding of the role of the sublime landscape in the 20th century.

[Nel Jones · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love Yi-Fu Tuan

[Travis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Big fan of Tuan's philosophy on humanistic geography, every book of his I've read is insightful and super interesting, granting a cool perspective on the way we interact with the natural world through mythology, story, societal beliefs, among a variety of other topics. This one is focused more around the idea of romanticism in geographic, largely around how this fueled human exploration in history but covering a bunch of other ideas as well

[Lecturamateur · Rating 5 out of 5]

Por medio de un recorrido social- cultural describe la historia del pensamiento de los seres humanos con sus respectivas interacciones con el entorno.

Lo fantástico es la manera en que contrapone ideas de la cultura occidental con la oriental, el significado y valor de cada pensamiento es analizado para contar la historia social de los seres humanos.

El viaje de ser seres nómadas dónde deciden desarrollar sociedades agrícolas convirtiéndose en las bases del futuro el cual  culmina  en la construcción de ciudades para relegar de su pasado histórico.

Un viaje por lo sublime de la naturaleza que impacta a los humanos dónde algunos observan oscuridad y medios  para gobernar otros deciden ver esa gran majestuosidad aludiendo a lo romántico del paisaje.

Si duda alguna voy a leer otros libros de este autor que se posiciona en mis autores preferidos.

[Emma Sea · Rating 5 out of 5]

So enjoyable and thinky.