The characteristics of the factual travelogue content

Abstract

Introduction. The information space actively fills the author’s texts about travel to other people’s spaces, written in the travelogue genre – the modern variation of travel literature, a guidebook and travel essay. The aim is to identify content characteristics of the factual content of the travelogue. Methodology. The aim and objective of the research have led to the complex use of such research methods: bibliographic, systematization, phenomenological. The specificity of the bibliographic method consists in the content analysis of the author’s text and the discovery of the peculiarities of the publicist’s worldview in his context. In the selection, analysis, substantiation of the facts of the reality and their representation in the travelogue, a systematic approach has been applied. The peculiarity of the application of the phenomenological research method is to comprehend the personal intentions of the publicist-traveler, that play a major role in the selection and presentation of the factual content by the author. Results. Upon investigating the factual content of the travelogue, a conclusion has been made that the facts of reality are represented in the text by the author, first of all, as documentary, statistical images, which are often complemented by visual ones. The facts used by the publicist in the travelogue become signs of subjective copyright interpretation, and the grouping of facts depends on the content. The principle of documentary in the travelogue text is combined with the author’s intentions to comprehend the facts, and the journalistic synthesis of the perceived factual information is transmitted in the form of author’s judgments, generalizations, and conclusions. It has been established that the processing of the factual content is determined by the author’s intentions and genre features of the travelogue. Conclusions. The content of modern travelogues is saturated at the same time by statistical facts, documentary imagery, informativeness, and the presence of the author’s “I”. The problem requires further development and deeper investigation in order to specify the features of the textual organization of travelogues.