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Magic carpet of words

Introduction 3What you’ll learn 3

Advertising travel 4Travel accounts 7

Picture postcards 9Travel fiction 13Your own collection 15

4918AK: 5 Reading for Pleasure 1 OTEN, 2001/629/005/8/2003 P0027504

2 4918AK: 5 Reading for Pleasure OTEN, 2001/629/005/8/2003 P0027504

Introduction

In Section 4 you read various biographical and autobiographical accounts. In this section you’ll read about travel and adventure.

Travel writing has a very broad range: from advertisements about places, to travel diaries, stories about trips, picture postcards and travel accounts.

There’s romance about faraway places with strange sounding names. Even if we don’t travel to those places, we like to read about them, what they look like, what the climate is like, what flowers and fruit grow there, how the people live.

Travel writing can be informative, entertaining, and in the case of advertisements, persuasive.

What you’ll learnIn this section you’ll learn the features of:

travel writing

writing about adventure

descriptive writing

persuasive writing.

We’ll start by reading different kinds of travel writing about Uluru (Ayers Rock), to discover the differences between them.


Advertising travel


All these extracts give information about the same object: Uluru/Ayers Rock, but they are also trying to sell trips to readers, so they use persuasive writing. What are the features of such writing?


Activity 1: Which words create the picture for us?

Start by looking at the words. Pick out the adjectives and nouns that describe the rock. Then comment on their effect.

The first one is done for you. The adjectives are in italics:

1 bright red, sunbaked contours, prehistoric leviathan, brooding majesty, ancient rock formations, unique magic.

The words describe the rock’s colour (bright red), age (prehistoric and ancient) size (leviathan) and appearance (contours, brooding, rock formations, majesty). The word leviathan is a metaphor comparing the rock to a giant, and brooding majesty personifies the rock giving it the awe of a large royal appearance. Unique magic gives it special appeal, suggesting it is the only one of its kind.

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Turn to the Suggested responses to check your answers.

Travel brochures and travel advertisements have features of persuasive writing because they are designed to sell. To be effective, persuasive writing aims to:

gain the attention and interest of the reader

then create a desire and prompt action.

Do the three items you’ve just read have these features of persuasive writing? Let’s examine them.

Number 1 catches our attention by giving us the size of the rock—1000 feet high and a mile long—which is impressive. Our interest is gained by all the adjectives and nouns we’ve just examined in Activity 1. Then the words, To even begin to appreciate the unique magic of the place, you have to be there, create a desire in the reader. In such writing, the action is prompted by a paragraph at the end of the article which tells the would-be traveller


how to make bookings: For bookings and further information on accommodation, simply phone…

Travel accountsWe know that an advertisement has to sell, so it usually gives a favourable picture of a placein fact, advertisements often exaggerate and may even distort the truth.

Now that you’ve read three advertisements for Uluru, let’s see what travellers think. In your anthology is an account written Becky Sample, an American.

Turn to the anthology and read ‘An American at Uluru’.

Assignment

This activity forms part of Assignment 2

Activity 2: How does Becky Sample convey her feelings?

1 Why did Becky Sample decide to visit Uluru?

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2 What phrases does she use to describe Alice Springs?

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3 What gave the feeling that every day was Sunday?

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4 What effects did the heat have on Becky?

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5 Why do you think she experienced a humbleness?

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6 When she gets to the top of the rock (paragraph ten), Becky describes her impressions and feelings in different ways. Select phrases that convey these.

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7 In the second part of paragraph ten, Becky describes her feelings in a unique way. Comment on her description.

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8 What does this reference show about Becky’s feelings?

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9 What is the final effect of the climb up Uluru?

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10 Some people believe it is wrong to climb the rock as it is a sacred place for Aboriginal people. Are there any parts of the texts about Uluru which may offend some readers?

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Picture postcards

The kind of travel writing most of us experience is the message on a picture postcard. You may have written some yourself, received some or seen some others have received. They are a way of keeping in touch without taxing the traveller. The recipient feels remembered by the friend (or relative) who is having a good time.

On the following pages we’ve reproduced some postcards from Australia (these are reproduced with permission of the author, Elizabeth Gardner). Read the messages on the postcards, then answer the questions in Activity 5.

Activity 3: What are the features of postcards?

1 What is the level of language used on postcards? Is it formal or informal?

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2 What do people usually write about on postcards?

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3 What is usually the tone of the language? For example, is it happy or sad?

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4 What are some of the features of the writing on postcards? (For example, messages are short, limited by the space on the postcard and the time people have to write.)

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Travel fictionTravel writing exists in fiction too. You will find several books of travel fiction writing in the library. One of the most famous writers of travel fiction is Jules Verne, a French writer. Though he wrote in the 1890s, his works were translated into English nearly a hundred years later.

Some of his most popular books are Five weeks in a balloon, Journey to the centre of the earth, From earth to moon, Twenty thousand leagues under the sea and Around the world in eighty days. You might like to borrow some of these from your library. Some of Verne’s books have been turned into movies; for example, Around the world in eighty days. Reading his books of travel fiction is like travelling on a magic carpet of words.

Let’s look at a couple of his books.

Five weeks in a balloon

In this book, Dr Samuel Fergusson decides to cross the great African continent without encountering any of its dangers. He designs a balloon that takes him, his friend Dick Kennedy and his servant Joe across the mighty continent.

Travel fiction has features of the different kinds of writing that you have already learnt about. It’s a blend of narrative and descriptive writing with elements of factual and imaginative writing.

In Five weeks in a balloon, we are given details of the construction of the balloonsfor there are two, one inside the othertheir size, weight, and the fabric of which they are made. Details are also given of the car or basket in which the men would travel. Factual details are also given of how the balloons work and the weight of the men and their possessions that the balloon would have to carry. Great care is taken to make the account sound authentic.

Let’s read a description. At one stage of their journey the balloon was in danger of being ripped apart by giant birds.

The birds were now clustered together at a little distance, and it was easy to distinguish their bare and featherless throats distended with the efforts of their screams, and their cartilaginous crests, crowned with violet-coloured excrescences, which they erected with fury. They were of enormous size, measuring fully four feet in length, with stretch of wing of more than twenty feet. Their white wings glittered again in the sunbeams. One would have thought them winged sharks, to which they bore a terrible resemblance.


This is one of the adventures that the trio have.

Around the world in eighty days

This exciting book is continually being reprinted. It is the story of Phileas Fogg who makes a wager for £20 000 to travel around the world in eighty daysquite a feat when there were no aeroplanes. Accompanied by his French valet Passepartout, they have adventures that are exciting and full of suspense. They travel by train, steamboat, sledge and elephant to keep to their itinerary.

While some of the incidents may seem fanciful, they still grip the reader. For example, there’s a story of the saving of a damsel in distress which is done in the best tradition of dare devilry.

In a forest on the way to Allahabad, the travellers come upon a funeral party. They are intrigued by the presence of a beautiful girl loaded down with jewels and gems walking with faltering steps. On inquiry they find that she is the wife of a rajah who died and is to burn herself on the funeral pyre of her husband. The woman is unwilling but has been drugged with fumes of hemp and opium. Shocked by the idea of the sacrifice, Phileas Fogg wants to save her.

Focus on words

There are some words we hear often, but are not sure of their meanings. In this section you came across these five words:

propaganda, preconceptions, relentless, inconceivable, stereotypes.

The sentences in which they appeared are given below.

A stunning piece of propaganda really. I couldn’t help thinking ‘but it’s really just a rock’.

America being so far away and much of my preconceptions so damn… American.

In every direction, just miles and miles of scorched red land looking up and closing its eyes to the relentless sun.

I stood in front and looked up at the inconceivable massiveness of it.

Oh how all the stereotypes I had scoffed at applied to me and my swollen feet.


Activity 4: Meanings of words

Do you know what the words above mean? Could you use them in sentences of your own? Write your sentences below.

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Activity 5: Your choice

Find a piece of travel writing that appeals to you—it could be a book, an article, a travel diary or even just a postcard or advertisement! You can use a piece from the anthology if you wish. Write about 100 words about why the piece appeals to you, referring to at least some of the features of travel writing we have examined in this section.

Your own collectionAs you read magazines or newspapers, cut out examples of travel writing that you find interesting. Make a note of why they appealed to you.


Assignment

Send all three parts of Assignment 1 in to your teacher when you have finished section 5.


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