Criticism of Bryson’s novels is not advanced but his narratives can be investigated in terms of genre, intertextuality, language, and nationality. This paper expands on the topic of Bryson’s view both of Great Britain and the United States of America by means of national stereotyping as it emerges from his novels Notes from a Small Island (1995) and Notes from a Big Country (1998). I maintain that Bryson depicts Britain and America in an authentic and educative as well as hilarious and exaggerated manner to emphasize differences between the nations in question. I will prove my thesis that Bryson both criticises and praises British and American values which affect the national character. Bryson conveys his national views both from the perspective of an insider and outsider.
William “Bill” McGuire Bryson was born in Des Moines, Iowa, in 1951. In 1973, he travelled to England where he became acquainted with his wife, Cynthia Billen, with whom he has four children. Bryson lived in Yorkshire, returned to America to graduate in 1995, and resided with his family in Norfolk, in 2003. While in America Bryson is well-known for elaborating on the English language, he accomplished bestseller standing with travelogues in Great Britain. Although he claims not to be a travel writer because he “stumbled into this genre”, Bryson composes “books on travel and the English language” in which his
“wanderlust and eccentricity” promise a unique reading adventure (Oder 191).
Travel writing is a neglected but miscellaneous genre of ancient times which flourished in the sixteenth century and encompasses narratives of expansionism, such as
encyclopaedic accounts of foreign nations, and became the principal negotiator of propagating stereotypes in colonial novels. While Bryson’s journey novel Notes from a Small Island
depicts the Great Britain he adores, he grudgingly wrote columns about America which resulted in his journalistic novel Notes from a Big Country.
Table of Contents
1. Abstract
2. National Stereotypes in Anglo-American Fiction
3. Bill Bryson’s View Both of Great Britain and the United States of America by Means of National Stereotyping in Notes from a Small Island and Notes from a Big Country
3.1. Bryson’s View of Great Britain in Notes from a Small Island
3.2. Bryson’s View of the United States of America in Notes from a Big Country
4. A Comparative Enquiry of Bryson’s Views of Britain and America
5. Conclusion
6. Bibliography
1. Abstract
Criticism of Bryson’s novels is not advanced but his narratives can be investigated in terms of genre, intertextuality, language, and nationality. This paper expands on the topic of Bryson’s view both of Great Britain and the United States of America by means of national stereotyping as it emerges from his novels Notes from a Small Island (1995) and Notes from a Big Country (1998). I maintain that Bryson depicts Britain and America in an authentic and educative as well as hilarious and exaggerated manner to emphasize differences between the nations in question. I will prove my thesis that Bryson both criticises and praises British and American values which affect the national character. Bryson conveys his national views both from the perspective of an insider and outsider.
William “Bill” McGuire Bryson was born in Des Moines, Iowa, in 1951. In 1973, he travelled to England where he became acquainted with his wife, Cynthia Billen, with whom he has four children. Bryson lived in Yorkshire, returned to America to graduate in 1995, and resided with his family in Norfolk, in 2003. While in America Bryson is well-known for elaborating on the English language, he accomplished bestseller standing with travelogues in Great Britain.[1] Although he claims not to be a travel writer because he “stumbled into this genre”, Bryson composes “books on travel and the English language” in which his “wanderlust and eccentricity” promise a unique reading adventure (Oder 191).
Travel writing is a neglected but miscellaneous genre of ancient times which flourished in the sixteenth century and encompasses narratives of expansionism, such as encyclopaedic accounts of foreign nations, and became the principal negotiator of propagating stereotypes in colonial novels. While Bryson’s journey novel Notes from a Small Island depicts the Great Britain he adores, he grudgingly wrote columns about America which resulted in his journalistic novel Notes from a Big Country.[2]
Stereotypes, also called prejudice, stigma or cliche, derive from Greek “stereos”, cover permanent images, and originally designate printing plates. A stereotype is a fixed or a generalizing, simplifying attitude towards other groups. William G. Sumner’s (1840-1910) distinction of “in-group” and “out-group”, namely “us” and “them”, has been influential throughout the twentieth century.[3] Stereotypes help us to understand a foreign culture because they are forecasts about foreigners and compress intricate contents by categorising. However, they are based on deficient information about culture and nationality. Although they can be justified by experience, they are prerequisite for the emergence of bias. Stereotypes are affirmative or negative, whereby the latter specifically defies adjustment to truth, and opposes identification and modification because they are disseminated by the media. Stereotyping evolves through the stress of individual traits and excessive use of typological catalogues which have already been existent. Fiction is a key supplier of stereotyping, in which auto- and heterostereotypes prevail.[4]
Literary criticism neglected stereotypes until the 1960s and Walter Lippmann’s Public Opinion (1922) utters scepticism about them. But they are a top branch of research in the humanities, such as in imagologist and comparative studies, whereby transatlantic perceptions are outstanding. Imagolist studies focus on national stereotypes in fiction that is the author’s image of a foreign nation. The truth value of cliches and their effects are central to evaluate how a reputation has become recognizable.[5] I will discuss the historical advance of national stereotypes in Anglo-American literature, in 2. In 3., I will analyse Bryson’s view of Britain and America, for comparison, in 4. In 5., I will give an outlook.
2. National Stereotypes in Anglo-American Fiction
The topic of nation has governed the humanities since 1980, means “descent” as facet of group distinction, and indicates “a people with a common origin, tradition, and language”.[6] Even if national stereotypes are gradually more refused, they remain significant because of their manipulation both of the response to literature and of social life. Since they are learnt prematurely and help to label identity, they are defiant to alteration. Their intention to portray foreign nations is based on socio-historical conditions, in which natives are presented as individuals and foreigners in categories.[7] Therefore, “a nation is most itself in those aspects wherein it is most unlike the others” (Leerssen 3). Britain’s and America’s nation is best understood in the context of the British Empire and her colonial past. While the British instigate from Germanic tribes in what Shakespeare called a “secptr’d isle set in a silver sea”,[8] America had been populated by Native Americans until Christopher Columbus’ (1451-1506) arrival, in 1492, and became a European, primarily British colony then. The War of Independence (1775-83) announced the United States of America, which expunges the icon of America as a replica of Europe.[9]
From the sixteenth century until now, national stereotypes have been obtainable in literature due to enormous attention to national spirit and were outstanding in Elizabethan theatre. Originally, stereotypes derive from non-national typologies of human conduct which are drawn from the temperaments of humours and the theory of climatic zones that charges the influence of the climate to one’s character. The former determines character by the body fluids, namely phlegmatic, sanguine, choleric, and melancholic. John Arbuthnot’s The History of John Bull (1712) represents the typical Englishman as the “honest, plain-dealing fellow, choleric, bold”, who is adept and sovereign (Zacharasiewicz 94).[10]
With the growth of nations in the eighteenth century, character types were overformed with national characteristics and stereotypes advanced to differentiate the national self from the other. Particularly, Roman Catholicism and Frenchness came to be rejected as oddness by the English due to their antagonistic correlation. The rise of the novel advocated ideas of nationhood as “the symbolic form of the nation-state” because novels trace formations of cross-cultural attitudes.[11] While Henry Fielding (1707-1754) established the “History of National Manners”, Maria Edgeworth’s (1768-1849) Castle Rackrent (1800), Eliza Cook’s (1818-1889) poem “The Englishman” (1851), and caricatural prose satires propagated nationality.[12] Conversely, David Hume’s (1711-1776) essay “Of National Character” (1748) applies “the least of a national character” to the English to stress virtues of liberty.[13] While Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832) explains that novelists should analyse national character, Parrinder represents the novel’s task not to “speak for” but to the nation (9). English cliches were adapted in eighteenth-century America, such as the Cavalier as a descendant of the English gentleman. The ideal of the American was defined by J. Hector St. John de Crevecoeur’s (1735-1813) “What is an American”, in Letters from an American Farmer (1782), “as the product of a melting of different nations into ‘a new race of men’”.[14]
All in all, the ideal of Englishness was shaped by the eighteenth-century nobility but increasingly systemized in the Victorian Age. If English novels disapprove of America, Muriel Spark’s (1918-2006) “The Condition of England Novel” was popular in the postwar era, whereupon American values were admired rather than condemned, such as in David Lodge’s Changing Places (1975).[15] The English and American disposition has been discussed in premature and recent novels because they divulge a sagacity of what it is like to be English or American.[16]
3. Bill Bryson’s View Both of Great Britain and the United States of America by Means of National Stereotyping in Notes from a Small Island and Notes from a Big Country
I maintain that stereotypes are assumed beliefs about certain attributes which typically represent the whole of a nation, whose validity has to be proved. I will analyse Bryson’s national stereotyping in Notes from a Small Island, in 3.1., and Notes from a Big Country, in 3.2., to discuss his views of Britain and America, in an epochal context. The results will be critically compared, in 4.
3.1. Bryson’s View of Great Britain in Notes from a Small Island
In Notes from a Small Island, Bryson intends to give “[...] one last look at Britain - a kind of valedictory tour round the green and kindly island that had so long been [his] home” to scrutinize “the nation’s public face and private parts” before returning to America “to give the kids the chance of experiencing life in another country and [his] wife the chance to shop until 10 p.m. [...]”.[17] To portray his view of Great Britain, Bryson, who sympathizes with the “battered British psyche” (Oder 192), uses national stereotypes from the perspective of the American tourist because the British tend to regard their nation as a “‘foreign country’” through a voyeuristic perspective (Condor, ed. Barfoot 237).
For he writes in the domain of travel writing through reflecting his own journey, he fairly gives an autobiographical sketch about his life in England, such as journalistic work and learning about Cynthia (Bryson Island cf. 48; ch. 2; 79-83; ch. 5; 205; ch. 17). The narration is written in the first-person that is the “autodiegetic narrator” for “the subjective presentations” of Britain by the omnipresent narrator.[18] Although Bryson gets to know England “through the eyes of the insane”, which is “a particularly useful grounding for life in Britain” (Bryson 78; ch. 5), he gives a suitable impression of what it is like to travel through Britain. He criticises British public transport, for “if you travel much by public transport in Britain these days you [...] feel like a member of some unwanted sub-class [...]” (253; ch. 20). But, generally, “you [...] have an excellent train service” (323; ch. 27).
Bryson’s tour through Britain further illustrates that “literature is closely akin to the experience of travelling” (Stanzel 8). Journey novels depict voyages which are typically undertaken on foot, such as Fielding’s Tom Jones (1749),[19] who, like Bryson, is a rather unfortunate traveller because of mishaps, such as missing trains in Bryson’s case (cf. Parrinder 30). Primarily, Bryson portrays his view of Britain with journalistic techniques that is providing documentary facts and encyclopaedic details about Britain in a Defoe-like manner, such as that “1.2 million men worked in British coal mines (Bryson 299; ch. 24). Bryson further reports that “there are 45,687 street names in London”, but of whose “a few streets [...] sound like medical complaints” like “Burnfoot Avenue”, which is informative but patronizing (42; ch. 2).[20] Bryson charges the fondness of names to the British because “they can happily fill hours”, if you give “men in a pub the names of any two places in Britain” (30; ch. 1). The impression is that Bryson “spent more time in the library than on the road” because he offers a rich familiarity with Britain (Oder 192).
Bryson’s earliest experience with England, in 1973, reveals that “England was full of words [he]’d never heard before”, such as “high tea” and “dirty weekend”, which illustrates chief linguistic differences between American and British English (Bryson 19; prologue; cf.
11, 21), such as “thank Christ” and “thank goodness” (76-77; ch. 5; cf. 242; ch. 19). Bryson approves of “this new way of talking”, such as “Fanned Galia Melon [...] served with a Mixed leaf Salad”, which depicts English food as something fabulous (118-119; ch. 8). The narrator warns the reader not to “fuck with their puddings” so that British specialities are conveyed in a humorous way (119).
Particularly, Bryson draws frequent intertextual references to English literature, such as Daniel Defoe’s (1660-1731) crime novel Moll Flanders (1722), when he argues that “normalcy is an Anglicism” (emphasis original).[21] Bryson makes the reader aware of the fact that “when you are an American living in Britain [...] America will be the death of English” (290). He explains that “British speech has been enlivened [...] by words created in America” (290). The fact that Bryson’s “skin was lightly oiled with the dirt and grit of two nations” explains his wandering between two worlds of different cultures which have been influencing one another for a long time (17).
Krishan Kumar, in The Making of English National Identity (2003), distinguishes between cultural and political nation, in which Great Britain denotes political and England cultural nation with which the novel affiliates (cf. Parrinder 17-18). Bryson depicts the latter because he writes about individual parts of Britain. First, he regards Britain as “a big place” which is “extravagantly green” and conveys the image of “a lonely island in the middle of an empty green sea” that is “a densely crowded island” (Bryson 29; ch. 1; 139; ch. 10; 32; 285; ch. 23). This is because “one of the hardest things to adjust to, if you come from a large country,” that is America, “is that you are seldom really alone out of doors in England” (275; ch. 22). Hence, Britain is “small-scale” and “peaceful” (284; 100; ch. 6).
In contrast to England, Scotland appears to the tourist like what America must have been to frontiersmen, namely “miles of nothingness” in “a strange lost world” (325; ch. 27). Scotland is like a disparate British world because “Edinburgh felt like a different country [.] in an un-English fashion” (303; ch. 25). As typical Scottish merits Bryson lists “whisky” and is astonished about “how [...] well educated people from unprivileged backgrounds so often are” in Scotland (304, 309). This might be because “Scotland produces more [...] students [...] than any other nation” (303). Bryson’s account that “America must be about where Ireland is” confirms the difference of individual British nations (32). London is like another cosmos in comparison with England, too. Bryson claims that “Londoners fail to see that they live in the most wonderful city” because London is “more [...] interesting than Paris”, for it “has more history” (46; ch. 2). Indeed, “being a Londoner [...] becomes more important than being English” (Haseler 102).
To Bryson, the Scottish cannot be equalled with the English because he explains that he “came from the English-speaking world” (Bryson 342; ch. 28). He mocks the Scottish language by wondering “whatever it is Scots do when the sun goes doon” (302; ch. 25). Likewise, he scorns Welsh because “they had names that bore homage to other places [...] as if their owners feared that it would be too much of a shock to the system to remind visitors that they were in Wales” (251; ch. 20). He is amused that the Welsh lack “their own term for an illicit bonk” (258). While Ireland is mostly omitted, England contrasts a completely different Scotland and Wales.
Bryson holds different views of the British nation which are derived from his subjective impressions during his tour through Britain. Although he approves of England “very much” because he “was going to miss this”, he criticises British values throughout the novel, such as consumerism and Thatcherism because the English are, “as Mrs Thatcher proved, tolerant of dictatorships” (101; ch. 6; 228; ch. 18; cf. 187; ch. 15; 69; ch. 4; cf. 195196; ch. 16). First, he lists special qualities which you can appreciate only if you are British, such as “Marmite” and “really milky tea” (152; ch. 12). This explains that drinking tea frequently is as much a stereotype of the typical Englishman as Fish and Chips or the English weather which contains “that special English kind of drizzle that [...] saps the spirit” (cf.
Meyer 84-85; Bryson 128; ch. 9). Bryson claims that, for foreigners, “the most striking thing about the English weather is that there isn’t very much of it”, that is that Britain, in contrast to America, does not bear any risks of natural disasters such as “run-for-your-life hailstorms” (278; ch. 23), or that there is scarcely good weather in England. I think more typical stereotypes of Englishness are expensiveness and humour.
Throughout his novel, Bryson writes in a humoristic vein and is “impressed by the quality of humour you find in the most unlikely places [.] where it would simply not exist in other countries” (226; ch. 18). Thus, he admires the British for their “universal fondness for jokes” (265; ch. 21). When Bryson puts on his raincoat, for instance, he realizes that he “looked uncannily like a large blue condom” (127), which is amusing. But the dog incident is too much because it culminates in antagonistic behaviour (113-114; ch. 8).[22] Bryson admits that he is “‘still completely confused’ about the contrast between the British and American sense of humour” because there is more ‘cynicism in British life’, for humour ‘is a more widespread trait’ in England (Oder 192). Britons have ‘a natural gift for making [...] jokes about authority without ever challenging it’ that is humour is typically British.[23]
While foreigners are fascinated with British humour (cf. Fromkin 147), another speciality is their “innate sense of good manners” and “deference”, which “are such a fundamental part of British life” (Bryson 311; ch. 26). In fact, Haseler assigns “low [...] selfesteem and high levels of social deference” to twentieth-century Britons (71), for Britain’s image declined due to political reasons such as the Cold War (1945-1989).[24] Bryson explains that “any encounter with a stranger begins with the words ‘I’m terribly sorry but’ followed by a request of some sort” and “a hesitant, apologetic smile” (311; ch. 26). His remark that the British are “so quiet in hotel dining rooms” also expresses decency (Bryson 118; ch. 8). Good manners stem from the central image of the English gentleman which arose in the eighteenth century as a term for gallantry, namely the landed middle-class gentry (cf. Haseler 28, 50). The English gentleman is said to be civilised, noble, elitist, rural, and to have good manners (cf. 19, 72). But instead of one identity akin to the ideal of the gentleman, the British share several ones because England is a land of “many nations” due to cultural diversity (116; cf. 109, 112). Bryson’s aforementioned stereotypes honour the British for their excellent behaviour in a ridiculing way.
If the English are gentlemen, Bryson claims that the British “are the happiest people on earth” because they “are so easy to please” and “like their pleasures small” (98; ch. 6). While Fromkin charges “special virtues of moderation” and a “good sense” to the English (148), Haseler draws one’s attention to the fact that Calvinism is central for the understanding of Englishness (107). On the contrary, “this is completely alien to the American mind” because the “whole purpose of living [.] is to cram as much sensual pleasure as possible into one’s mouth” (Bryson 98). But moderation is a typically puritan and, thus, British virtue which shaped the American character, too. Even if Puritanism might be outdated, nowadays, it is still apparent in America such as in Methodism and Fundamentalism. In fact, puritans remain “a very powerful political voice in America today”.[25] Haseler clarifies that while Englishness deals with “one particular national [...] elite’s lifestyle [...] the American way of life dealt with the universal [...] themes of love, ambition, money, sex and violence” (87). Bryson’s suggestion that the British prefer small pleasures degrades them because many people essentially like immense delights.
[...]
[1] Cf. Norman Oder, “Bill Bryson: An Ex-expatriot Travelling Light” (Publishers Weekly 4, 1998) 191-192. “Bill Bryson,” Jefferson Rabb, Bill Bryson About, Page 1, 29. Aug. 2007. http://www.randomhouse.com/features/billbryson/flat/about.php, 1.
[2] US title: Bill Bryson, I’m a Stranger Here Myself. Notes on Returning to America After Twenty Years Away (New York: Broadway Books, 1999). Cf. “Travel Book,” J. A. Cuddon, Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory (London: Penguin Books, 1999) 937-944. J. Paul Hunter: “The ‘Occasion’ of Robinson Crusoe.” Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe. An Authoritative Text. Background and Sources. Criticism, Ed. Michael Shinagel (New York [u.a.]: Norton, 1975) 368, 373-375. Oder 191-192. Mary Louise Pratt, Imperial Eyes. Travel Writing and Transculturation (London and New York: Routledge, 1992) 10. Waldemar Zacharasiewicz, “National Stereotypes in Literature in the English Language: A Review of Research.” The Yearbook of Research in English and American Literature 1 (Tübingen: Narr, 1982) 88, 100.
[3] Günther Blaicher, ed., “Bedingungen literarischer Typisierung.” Erstarrtes Denken: Studie zu Klischee, Stereotyp und Vorurteil in englischsprachiger Literatur (Tübingen: Narr, 1987) 23. Hagen Schulze, Staat und Nation in der europäischen Geschichte (München: Beck, 1994) 111.
[4] Cf. “Stereotype,” Robert Allen, ed., The Penguin Concise English Dictionary (London: Penguin Books, 2004). Blaicher 18. “Cliché,” Cuddon 141. Marco Cinnirella, “Ethnic and National Stereotypes: A Social Identity Perspective.” Beyond Pug’s Tour. National and Ethnic Stereotyping in Theory and Literary Practice, ed. Cedric C. Barfoot (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1997) 39-40. Susan Condor, “‘Having History’: A Social Psychological Exploration of Anglo-British Autostereotpyes,” Ed. Barfoot, 216. David Fausett, “‘Another World, Yet the Same’: Ethnic Stereotyping in Early Travel Fiction,” Ed. Barfoot, 144. Helmbrecht Breinig and Arno Heller, “Introduction: Stereotyping America,” Negotiations of America’s National Identity, eds. R. Hagenbüchle and J. Raab, Vol 2 (Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 2000) 455. Silke Meyer, Die Ikonographie der Nation. Nationalstereotype in der englischen Druckgraphik des 18. Jahrhunderts (Münster [u. a.]: Waxmann, 2003) 3, 22, 353, 363, 365. Andrée Michel, Down with Stereotypes! Eliminating sexism from children’s literature and school textbooks (Paris: Unesco, 1986) 16. Franz Karl Stanzel, “National Stereotypes in Literature,” Images of Central Europe in Travelogues and Fiction by North American Writers, Ed. Waldemar Zacharasiewicz (Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 1995) 1, 7. Zacharasiewicz Language 75. “National Stereotype,” Joep Leerssen, National Identity and National Stereotype, Page 1-3, 04. Sep. 2007. http://cf.hum.uva.nl/images/info/leers.html, 3. “Stereotypes,” Stereotypes. Definition and Vocabulary Glossary, Page 1-3, 04. Sep. 2007. http://the_english_dept.tripod.com/stereo2.htm, 1-2.
[5] 9. Leerssen 1, 3. Meyer 15, 22.
[6] “Nation,” Allen. Cf. Meyer 75. Schulze 112.
[7] Cf. Cinnirella, ed. Barfoot 49, 51. Ton Hoenselaars, “National Stereotypes in English Renaissance Literature,” Beyond Pug’s Tour. National and Ethnic Stereotyping in Theory and Literary Practice, Ed. Cedric C. Barfoot (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1997) 86, 91. “National Stereotypes,” NIH News. National Institutes of Health. National Stereotypes Common, Mistaken, Study Reports. Page 1-2, 04. Sep. 2007. http://www.nih.gov/news/pr/oct2005/nia-06.htm, 1. Riesz, ed. 4. Stanzel, ed. Zacharasiewicz 2. Zacharasiewicz 75, 118
[8] Stephen Haseler, The English Tribe. Identity, Nation and Europe (London: Macmillan, 1996) 14-15
[9] Cf. Nina Baym, ed., et al., “Introduction,” Literature to 1820, The Norton Anthology of American Literature, 6th ed., 5 vols. (New York: Norton, 2003) A: 3-10. Edward W. Chester, Europe Views America. A Critical Evaluation (Washington D. C.: Public Affairs Press, 1962) 91, 144. “American War of Independence,” Page 1., 02. Nov. 2003. http://www.abacci.com/history/history.aspx?historyID=73, 1.
[10] Cf. John Hayman, „Notions on National Characters in the Eighteenth Century,“ Huntington library Quarterly: A Journal for the History and Interpretation of English and American Civilization 35 (1971) 12. Meyer 334-337, 340, 343-344, 363. Schulze 121. Stanzel, ed. Zacharasiewicz 2-3. Zacharasiewicz 78, 80, 83, 117.
[11] Patrick Parrinder, Nation and Novel. The English Novel from its Origins to the Present Day (Oxford: Oxford U P, 2006) 14. Cf. Fausett 133.
[12] Parrinder 25. Cf. Stephen Greenblatt, ed., et al., The Norton Anthology of English Literature, 8th ed., 2 vols. (New York, London: Norton & Company, 2006)2: 226-228, 1615-1616.
[13] Zacharasiewicz 95. Cf. Greenblatt, ed., et al. 1: 2841-2842. Hayman 13. Meyer 339.
[14] Peter Freese, ed., Viewfinder Topics. From Melting Pot to Multiculturalism. Epluribus unum?, 1st ed. (Munchen: Langenscheidt, 1994) 4. Cf. Baym A: 657-667. Orm 0verland, “Homemaking Myths: The Creation of Ethnic Memory as a Response to Exclusive Definitions of ‘American’”, Remembering the Individual/ Regional/National Past, eds. Michael Draxlbauer and Michael Zacharasiewicz (Tubingen: Stauffenburg, 1999) 15. Zacharasiewicz 77, 91, 96, 114-115, 117. Cf. Haseler 23-24. Hoenselaars, ed. Barfoot 85. Meyer 352-353, 370. Parrinder 26.
[15] For details, see David Lodge, Changing Places (London: Penguin Books, 1975).
[16] Cf. Blaicher 14. Haseler 17-19. Parrinder 19, 29. Menno Spiering, “Englishness and Post-War Literature,” Beyond Pug’s Tour. National and Ethnic Stereotyping in Theory and Literary Practice, Ed. Cedric C. Barfoot (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1997) 269-270. Stanzel, ed. Zacharasiewicz 6.
[17] Bill Bryson, Notes from a Small Island (London: Black Swan, 1995) 34; ch. 1.
[18] Sonja Fielitz, Roman: Text und Kontext, 1st ed. (Berlin: Cornelsen, 2001) 62, 65.
[19] For details, see Henry Fielding, Tom Jones (Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Classics, 1992).
[20] More examples are to be found in Bryson, Island 54-55; ch. 3; 181, 184; ch. 14; 331, ch. 27.
[21] Bryson, Island 290; ch. 23. Cf. Greenblatt 1: 2288-2289. For further intertextual references see Bryson, Island 92; ch. 6; 109; ch. 7; 128; ch. 9; 159; ch. 12; 245; ch. 19; 304; ch. 25. For details, see Daniel Defoe, Moll Flanders (London: Penguin Popular Classics, 1994).
[22] For more examples of Bryson’s wit see Bryson Island 25; 96; ch. 6; 158; ch. 12; 267; ch. 21; 314; ch. 26.
[23] Oder 192. Cf. David Fromkin, ed., “The Importance of Being English. Eyeing the Sceptered Isles,” Foreign Affairs 78 (1999) 148. Meyer 84.
[24] Cf. Baym, Literature since 1945, E: 1964-1965.
[25] “America Puritanism Today,” Gavin Finley, America’s Puritans Today and the ‘Religious Right’, Pages 1-20, 16. Oct. 2006. http://endtimepilgrim.org/puritans 13.htm, 3.
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- Oliver Baum, M.A. (Author), 2007, Bill Bryson´s View of Great Britain and the USA in "Notes from a Small Island" and "Notes from a Big Country", Munich, GRIN Verlag, https://www.grin.com/document/123533
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