Cross-cultural Imagination: Arthur Young Wrote The French Before The Great Revolution

Arthur Young was the famous British agronomist and traveler in the late 18 th century,who tested their agricultural views through his agricultural inspection. He has been most parts of the UK, Ireland, Wales and France and other places, and left a large amount of famous agricultural notes which were of great historical value for later researchers who studied the French agriculture and the social situation at that time. Of course, his most famous work was“Travels in France during 1787-1789”, this article attempts to disentangle what he saw during the French Revolution with cross-cultural perspective.This paper is divided into the introduction, body and conclusion. The introduction mainly expounds the paper’s topics basis, current research status, research ideas, methods and innovations and so on. Body part has five chapters. Body part tries to present the whole French picture in the eyes of Arthur Young- an Englishman from a cross-cultural perspective and to discern cultural traits of the British and French through the interpretation of these pictures. The first chapter analyzes the background of Young’s French travel and travel writings from Young’s personal writing experience, travel experience and “Continental Study Tour” respectively; The second chapter focuses on interpreting French agriculture picture he depicts in “Travels in France during 1787-1789” and cross-cultural understanding. French agriculture is the starting point of Young’s French travel and the focus of the article. But the descriptions of French agriculture are always based on British agriculture. It mainly includes three aspects — — the French superior geographical environment, the French low-yielding agricultural situation and the reasons for French low-yielding agriculture. The final conclusion is the improvement of French agriculture must rely on the reform of the political system. The third chapter focuses on of cross-cultural interpretation of French city. It is divided into natural scenery along the way and urban infrastructure(the French theater,transportation, post, public infrastructure construction, etc.) two parts, and uses urban construction of British as a benchmark to reveal the backwardness of French and political corruption; The fourth chapter, after the overall grasp of “Travels in France”, it takes on analyzing the details which Young depicts and makes a cross-cultural interpretation of the national characteristics of French before start of the French Revolution — they are silent,ignorant and lack of practical thinking and public awareness. It is these national qualities that result in the outbreak of the French Revolution and backwardness of French; The Fifth chapter tries to dissect the explanations for French images presented in “Travels in France”respectively, from the travel factor- travel time, travel and other aspects of perspective and purpose of travel.The French pictures presented in “Travels in France” are not only simple reflection of French society at that time, but also imagination of the French based on British cultural recognitions. We can take this opportunity to deeply analyze national cultural traits of the British and French and then make deep cultural reflection. Only through constant cultural clash, integration and reflections, can the nation get the steady fresh power.