1 Travelling Against Time: Flemish Authors Travelling to Italy in the Interwar Period Tom M.J. Sintobin* Department of Cultural Studies, Radboud University, Nijmegen, The Netherlands According to The World Tourism Organization available for Belgian visitors. What is more, it was (World Bank Group, n.d.a), the number of only after 1927 that the Belgians got their own tourist arrivals worldwide was over one billion category in these statistics; before that, they were in 2015, three times more than in 1995. The included in the same category with the Dutch, Yearbook of Tourism Statistics shows a steady rise, Danish and Scandinavians. Syrjämaa (1997) cal- with only two interruptions: minor dips between culated that in 1927 16,000 Belgians travelled to 2002 and 2003 and between 2008 and 2009. Italy. That number remained the same in 1928, It is tempting to link the dips to events that had grew to 25,000 in 1929, then dropped to 13,956 a massive global impact: the terror attacks from in 1930, presumably because of the financial autumn 2001 and the start of the economic crisis. 1931 and 1932 – the last years for which crisis with the collapse of Lehman Brothers in she tried to provide numbers – showed a rapid September 2008. Although this explanation is increase despite the global economic crisis, with all too easy1, it is striking that the effect of those respectively 39,987 and 36,769 Belgian visitors events seems very limited: a drop in tourist ar- (Syrjämaa, 1997, p. 393). Professor in economics rivals of about 1.3% and 4.2% respectively. The Fernand Baudhuin claims in 1931 that ‘le Belge conclusion might be that the tourist industry is voyage peu hors de chez lui; l’une des raisons not much affected by external events on a global doit être trouvée dans les prix plus élevés ailleurs’ scale, no matter how devastating their nature. (Baudhuin, 1931, p. 196), but does not come up But do they affect the tourist discourse? How do with exact numbers. According to Yves Segers, tourist narratives respond to such realities? The Belgians spent 200 million BEF abroad in 1929, question is evidently too broad for one chapter, 125 million in 1935 and 150 million in 1936 – so I will concentrate on one specific historical with Italy and Lourdes as popular destinations case study: Flemish travellers to Italy in the in- (Segers, 2003, p. 219). terwar period. Although we will never know exact num- It is impossible to say how many people from bers, we can derive from different phenomena the Flemish-speaking part of Belgium visited that Italy was clearly in the picture as a travel Italy in those days: there are only statistical data destination for Flemish travellers in those days. * t. sintobin@ let. ru. nl © CAB International 2019. Literary Tourism: Theories, Practice and Case Studies (eds I. Jenkins and K.A. Lund) 3 4 T.M.J. Sintobin In 1922 a journal for tourists was started under groeien (Timmermans, 1926) the name De Toerist (the name was changed to 4. H. Haeck, De bedevaart van Toon Verheyen Toerisme in 1926) by the Vlaamschen toeristen- (Haeck, 1928) bond, an organization that was also established 5. E. Van Hemeldonck & Fr. Ramon, Van Toontje in 1922 and had over 100,000 (mostly middle die naar Rome ging (Van Hemeldonck and class) members within a decade (Raymaekers, Ramon, 1927) 2012). Italy featured quite often in its contents. 6. M. van Hoeck, Schoonheidsvizoenen. There was a lot of practical information on Reisindrukken uit Italië (Van Hoeck, 1928) travel schemes, the prices of the visa2, passports, 7. Alfons Lambrecht, Naar de Gondelstad new rules and regulations for foreign visitors, (Lambrecht, 1928) available guidebooks. They announced lectures, 8. Gab. Celis, Door het kunstrijk Italië (Celis, slideshows and movies3, they reported on new 1929) traffic infrastructre and they applauded the es- 9. Gab. Celis, Naar Rome: reisindrukken (Celis, tablishment of the ‘Touring Club Italo-Tedesco, 1928) Deutsch-Italienischer Touristenverband’. 10. Jozef Simons, In Italië (Simons, 1930) Furthermore, they published travelogues. 11. M.E. Belpaire, Reukwerk (Belpaire, 1932) Already in the very first year there was a series 12. Louisa Duykers, Aquarellen uit Italïe of texts by G. Celis, a priest who reported ex- (Duykers, 1933) tensively on his journey to Italy in April 1914, 13. Hilarion Thans, Vertellen: Derde Deel (Thans, and similar texts were published in the course 1937) of subsequent years.4 They also published re- 14. Cyriel Verschaeve; Italië. Studies over kunst views of travelogues. One example is the review (Verschaeve, 1938) of Een klassieke reis in het ‘Schoone Italië’ by Claes 15. Hilarion Thans, Door oud en nieuw Italië (1925); the reviewer calls it a ‘practical’ book, (Thans, 1938) a must-have ‘for those who travel as tourists to 16. Hilarion Thans, Langs heilige bergen. Italy’.5 Vertellen: 4 (Thans, 1941) In this chapter, I will focus on literary ac- counts of journeys to Italy, published as books, This means an average of one travelogue a year: by Flemish authors who visited fascist Italy in there clearly was a market for these books. I was the interwar period. How do their travelogues unable to find information on readers, but in one relate to a long tradition of cultural depictions of of the books I consulted I found the following the country and to the political reality of those handwritten text: ‘Souvenir of my trip to Rome days? in the Holy Year 1925’ – which means that trav- ellers were buying them. Since paid holidays for ordinary working people were only established Description of the Database and in 1936 in Belgium, it seems logical that many Political Context people reading these travelogues did so as ‘arm- chair tourists’, without being able to go to Italy themselves. It proved to be very difficult to trace the exact Some of these books were (modified) re- number of travelogues, but by systematically prints. Een klassieke reis in het ‘Schoone Italië’ analysing Boekengids – a bibliographical maga- (Claes, 1925) by Ernest Claes was first pub- zine that started in 1921 – I was able to iden- lished in 1908 under the title Het schooner tify 16 travelogues entirely dedicated to a trip to Italië. Reisvertelling (1908). Aquarellen uit Italïe Italy and published as books between 1925 and (Duykers, 1933) by Louisa Duykers featured in 1941. They were written by 13 different Flemish 1911 in the literary magazine Dietsche Warande authors: & Belfort. A part of Timmermans’s text featured 1. Jozef Deswert, Naar Rome! ‘Anno Santo’ as a series in De Maasbode and Nieuwe Venlosche (Deswert, 1925) Courant in the summer of 1925 and Celis pub- 2. Ernest Claes, Een klassieke reis in het ‘Schoone lished earlier in De Toerist. Apart from Felix Italië’ (Claes, 1925) Timmermans, who published his travelogue 3. Felix Timmermans, Naar waar de appelsienen with his usual Dutch publishing house, all the Travelling Against Time 5 publishing houses are Flemish and Catholic. murdered by members of the Ceka, who possi- Almost half of the authors were priests (Thans; bly received their orders directly from Mussolini Verschaeve; Celis; Van Hoeck; Haeck; Deswert), (Carocci, 1975, p. 32). In his ‘Discorso sul delitto the others were non-clerical but moving, work- Matteotti’ on 3 January 1925 in the House of ing and publishing in Catholic circles. Among Representatives, Mussolini claimed personal re- them, there were two women, Duyckers and sponsibility for inciting the violence in the coun- Belpaire, both connected to the literary maga- try and declared himself dictator, arguing that zine Dietsche Warande & Belfort as authors, and Italy needed stability at all costs. The murder, the in the case of the latter, also as mentor and fi- investigation and the trial, as well as Mussolini’s nancer. I was unable to find any travel books speech, were widely covered in newspapers all to Italy by authors from the other ‘pillars’ (the over the world, and the Low Countries were no term to describe the political and organizational exception. The assassination also meant the start segregation of societies along ideological lines), of a very turbulent and internationally media- socialist nor liberal, from the interwar period. tized relationship between the Belgian minister Evidently, for Catholics Italy was the coun- of foreign affairs from 1925 to 1927, the social- try to visit, since it had already been the seat of ist Emile Vandervelde, and il Duce. On 16 October the Church for centuries and was the most im- 1925, Vandervelde refused to meet Mussolini portant site of the Grand Tour. One of the first in person at the conference of Locarno. The reports of a Grand Tour, The Voyage of Italy, or, A next year, he was the only minister of foreign Complete Journey through Italy, was written by the affairs not to congratulate Mussolini after he Roman Catholic priest Richard Lassels (1670). survived an assault on 7 April (he only lost the In his ‘A preface to the reader’ he tries to counter tip his nose). In October 1926, Vandervelde gave those who say that he ‘hunt[s] too much after a speech at the occasion of a commemorative Ceremonies, and Church antiquities’ by saying plaque in honour of Matteotti in Brussels. The that ‘I cannot speak of Rome the Christian, but I socialist newspaper Vooruit published the follow- must speak of Relicks, Ceremonies and Religion’ ing quote: ‘I will not refer to the circumstances and by stressing that he paid a lot of attention of the crime. I will not look for the responsibili- to ‘prophane’ subjects as well. A steady stream ties. I want to register one thing: in present-day of travelogues about a pilgrimage to Rome had Europe one is allowed to kill a man, on condi- found its way to European readers for centu- tion that that man is a socialist, a revolutionary’ ries.