Resident Alien: Travel, Memoir, Gender

In this book Janet Wolff examines the ways in which travel is used as a metaphor in cultural theory, and the use of dance (another form of "mobility") as an image of liberation, particularly in relation to women. The topic of marginality is addressed - Walter Benjamin's marginality to the academy, the marginality of Gwen John and Rainer Maria Rilke in Paris in the 1900s - and the more general question of whether exile or distance provides a better vantage-point for cultural criticism than centrality and stability. Wolff seeks to break down the boundaries between academic and personal writing. The question of memoir and cultural theory is addressed with regard to Walter Benjamin, and several of the essays explore the particular meeting point of memory, personal experience, and cultural/sociological analysis. With its linked themes of exile, memoir and movement, the book has a wide range of focus: opera, rock 'n' roll, a Schubert quartet, feminist literary criticism, Gwen John's interiors, and Victorian lady travellers. Janet Wolff's book is an important contribution to cultural theory and feminist analysis.