The voyage ¿ the quest, the odyssey, the expedition ¿ is one of the driving forces of civilisation. From ancient times to the present day, human beings have travelled through necessity (wars, persecutions, economic and political pressures), by vocation (religious and humanitarian) and for pleasure (tourism, culture and sport).
A voyage intensifies our perception of self, leading us to define and redefine our identity in the liminal space where we are confronted with the Other. This often leads to a change of perspective in our attitudes to culture, identity and politics.
The sea is an important feature of the geography of both Ireland and France, so it is perhaps unsurprising that voyages occupy such an important place in the history of both countries. This volume explores aspects of French and Irish society, past and present, through the prism of the voyage. The contributors focus on a wide range of topics, including cultural tourism, literature, gastronomy and sport, in order to trace the ebb and flow of the exchanges between these two countries and their continued influence on one another.

Frank Healy is a senior lecturer in English for Academic Purposes at the University of La Rochelle and a member of the CRHIA (Research Centre for International Atlantic History). He worked for many years as an immunologist on the molecular basis of identity and published extensively in this field. More recently, he has been working on sociological aspects of identity, focusing on the assimilation of the Irish in Scotland.
Brigitte Bastiat teaches English at the University of La Rochelle and is an associate member of the CRHIA (Research Centre for International Atlantic History). She has published on identities, gender representations, the women¿s press in Ireland and France, Irish theatre and Irish, British and American cinema.

CONTENTS: Barbara Wright: Islands as Places of Self-Discovery: Majorca, Ré and Inishkea North - Grace Neville: Walking on Air: Le Docteur Potain Takes to the Skies over Dublin in 1785 - Eamon Maher: George Moore: Cultural Tourist in France - Michel Brunet: Les villégiatures bellifontaines de George Moore - Mary Pierse: To Bayreuth via Clapham Junction: George Moore, Cultural Tourist Par Excellence? - Michèle Milan: Travelling Correspondents of the Nation: Travel Writing, Translation and Transnationalism - Terry Phillips: «Out on a Great Adventure»: The Travels of Patrick MacGill - Ben Keatinge: «Of dream and deed sown in my travelling»: Denis Devlin's Poetics of Travel - Máirtín Mac Con Iomaire: The Influence of French Travellers on Irish Gastronomy - John Mulcahy: Food (in) Tourism Is Important, Or Is It? - Marjorie Deleuze: «A Unique Sense of Place, Culture and Hospitality»: Fáilte Ireland and the Rebranding of Ireland's Culinary Culture - Tony Kiely: «From Tullycross to La Rochelle»: Festival Food, French Connections and Relational Tourism Potential - Brian Murphy: Cognac, Scotch and Irish: Lessons in Gastronomic Identity - Sylvain Tondeur: A New Phenomenon: Whiskey Tourism in Ireland - Tanguy Philippe: Wrestling in Nineteenth- and Early Twentieth-Century Ireland and the Ethnic Stereotype of the Irish Fighter in the USA - Patricia Medcalf: Sport: Part of the DNA in National and Brand Identities - Julien Guillaumond: Marketing Irishness Today: A Study on Authenticity in French Businesses - Corinne Feïss-Jehel/Pierre-Jérôme Jehel: Paysages du tourisme irlandais : Une approche par l'image photographique.