Tasmania from below: Antarctic travellers' accounts of a southern "gateway"

• Published in: Studies in Travel Writing
• Main Author: Leane, E
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Taylor & Francis 2016
• Subjects: polar gateway; exploration; travel; Tasmania; Hobart; Antarctica; Antarctic; Antarc*
• Online Access: https://eprints.utas.edu.au/23901/; https://eprints.utas.edu.au/23901/1/Leane%20St%20Trav%20Writ.pdf; https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13645145.2015.1131513; https://doi.org/10.1080/13645145.2015.1131513

Tasmania is often represented in travel accounts as a remote place at the edge of the world. For Antarctic travellers, however, Tasmania is not only an end but also a means: a way-station rather than a destination, a point from which to commence the last leg of an expedition or a haven to return to at its conclusion, and sometimes a place to recuperate between multiple visits. This article examines representations of Tasmania – and particularly its capital city and main port, Hobart – produced by explorers and other travellers on their way to (or from) more southerly destinations. Antarctic travel texts compare and contrast Tasmania to higher latitudes, contextualising it not just as a far southern margin of the familiar world, but also as a northern limit of a lesser-known region of the globe. Both Antarctic travellers’ journeys and their narratives produce a connectedness between Tasmania and other circumpolar places, which in turn embeds the island within a new geographical imaginary: a southern rim surrounding a polar centre. These travel narratives reinforce the image of Hobart as a “gateway” but also put pressure on this term, suggesting a relationship with the far south that includes but goes beyond that of an exit or entry point.