Territories of the strange. Journey and writing at the limits of the human passion in Un monde sans rivage by Hélène Gaudy

Abstract

Hélène Gaudy’s story, Un monde sans rivage, was based on the authentic events of 1897. It is about the Swedish Andree’s balloon expedition to the North Pole, which ended in a catastrophe. The travelers’ remains were accidentally decanted in 1930 along with other items, including photos. Gaudy, taking historical facts as a starting point, translating visual into discursive ones, writes a story of an intriguing,heterogeneous form, which is the subject of analysis. The analytical key becomes the adjective “strange”, used by Andrée himself, which thus describes this journey. The presented analysis, with the help of the concept of strangeness, attempts to understand the essence of Andrée’s expedition in terms of human experience of the world and otherness, of crossing the limits of the possible.