Between Dream and Nightmare. The Austrian Deconstruction of the Myth of Pacific Islands

The aim of this chapter is to reflect on the construction and the deconstruction of the Pacific island myth during the past century in two peculiar literary works by Austrian authors. The exploration and the colonization of remote countries is a topic that innervates much nineteenth-century literature, a time when geographical discoveries were slowly defining the world map, and imperialist and colonialist experiences ended up involving, to some extent, countries like the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which had no tradition in colonial possessions. The Elsewhere and the Other are elements that move man’s scientific curiosity and are linked to the construction of an imaginary space that defines the European peoples themselves and their social and political space as compared to what is far away, desired, and at the same time feared. For authors like Lazar von Hellenbach (Die Insel Mellonta, 1883) and Robert Müller (Das Inselmädchen, 1919), dealing with the myth of Pacific islands is further evidence of the mythical, dreamlike and utopian nature of a transfiguration that acquires meaning in the light of the reality of the Habsburg Empire itself and the Europe of that time.