“TRAVELLING THE DOMESTIC”: A STUDY OF CECILIA

Abstract

Frances Burney’s novel Cecilia, travels through England geographically and through numerous modes of transport. It explores the concept of national identity in an England that is still determining its own. William Hogarth’s rules for determining the beauty of the Serpentine s in The Analysis of Beauty offer a model for the type of natural and beautiful travel around England that Burney attempts to construct, determining the most beautiful moral values of such an identity. Both the social implications and the modes of travel consider how this sense of beauty emerges throughout the novel, as Cecilia’s own subjective growth travels in tandem with her physical motion. Burney offers a model for travel that challenges the masculine Grand Tour, a type of travel that worked to divide that nation. Cecilia’s tour, in contrast, through England serves to promote social inclusivity and cohesion.