The Sublime Landscape of the Mediterranean Island in Nineteenth Century Travel Literature: From the "Locus Amoenus" to the "Locus Horribilis"

Abstract

With a particular study of a Mediterranean island, Majorca, this article analyzes the different aspects of the island’s landscape that gave the 19th century traveller a sensation of the sublime: the mountains and their black pine trees, their rocks, their cliffs, their solitude and their silence; the olive tree, the cave, and the sea and its poetry of infinity. In the insatiable quest for a sublime experience, the traveller abandons the island topic of the locus amoenus for the locus horribilis. The heavenly landscape becomes a terrifying place with its verticality, colossal size, chaos, immensity, infinity, and undefined, wildernessand harshness.