Henry Lansdell’s Repeat Journeys to Central Asia
Henry Lansdell’s Repeat Journeys to Central Asia

Between Self-censorship and Disclosure

Author(s): Irina Kantarbaeva-Bill
Subject(s): Cultural history, Studies of Literature, Theory of Literature, British Literature
Published by: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego
Keywords: Chinese Central Asia; Sinkiang; Tibet; British travelogue; Henry Lansdell; Great Game
Summary/Abstract: Reverend Henry Lansdell’s (1841–1919) preaching position allowed him to travel extensively, first in Europe and gradually to make long and arduous journeys in Russia, Siberia and Central Asia. His eight-volume travel accounts, running to several editions in England, confirmed Lansdell’s reputation as a talented and careful observer with unparalleled knowledge of the geopolitical situation in Central Asia in the second half of the 19th century. My paper examines the rhetorical strategies Lansdell employed in writing his last book on Central Asian sensitive border regions under the imperial security constraints of the moment. Lansdell’s failure of self-censorship in fact erupts in concealed messages, hidden between the words, smuggled past the censors, to reach certain sections of his readership able to read between the lines, revealing the undisclosed and unsaid of his repeat journeys.

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