Lurking Darkness: Darkness as an Entity Full of Meanings

Introduction

How often do we think of darkness as something, that has a history of its own? I am interested in darkness per se and how darkness has been experienced in the past and what kind of meanings it has been given. In this cultural history-based article I consider darkness as an entity that is given an active role, as something with agency. I focus on the darkness of the night, nocturnal darkness, for instance landscapes, when darkness transforms surroundings into unfamiliar spaces. Also, sometimes darkness, which manifests itself in places and situations without light or, when there was some interaction with other entities, turning the situation dark.

Experiencing darkness is always related to observation and therefore it is related to phenomenology. I focus on interaction between the nocturnal darkness and the travellers, but also interaction between darkness and other entities. Travel narratives form the source material of my research from which I have looked for descriptions of darkness. For this study, I have familiarized myself with the travel descriptions of the subjects of my research by looking for mentions of darkness in them. I have read their travel narratives, and every time I have found a mentions about darkness, night, nocturnality, moon, stars, dusk, twilight etc. and synonyms for those words I have focused on rereading the situation described in the text to understand in what tone the darkness and night have been mentioned, what emotions they have evoked, and what kind of experience the situation was overall. Also, I paid attention to the verbs describing the situation and I analysed those as a part of the experience described by travellers. Focusing on those different situations depicting darkness, I reached the meanings given to darkness. This research takes its cue also from the ontology as it suggests considering darkness as an entity, and a matter that can be approached by exploring what kinds of ideas exist about it. From every description of darkness I have found I searched the possible agency given to darkness. In this qualitative study I ask how did travellers in the 19th centuries describe their experiences of darkness, what meanings darkness was given, and was darkness seen as an entity with agency? I ponder whether the words used of the phenomenon have affected the experience of the matter in question. Has certain phraseology strengthened the agency of darkness? Has darkness made people feel in a certain way? The significance of this research lies in its contribution to shed a light on the cultural history of darkness, from the point of agency and experience and offers new perspectives to view darkness.

Of darkness

The topic of night and nocturnal darkness has been covered before by several authors from various points of view. For example, there are several studies of night-time, where the topic has been approached from various ways, for example Craig Koslofsky (2012) who writes of ghosts and witches, how they were associated to nocturnal hours, and about artificial lights in the cities, nocturnal spectacles and pleasures. History of street lighting and the night has also been covered by Wolfgang Schivelbusch (1995). A. Roger Ekirch (2005) deals with the night from a wide range of perspectives, like beliefs associated with the night, including those related to illness, death, and ghosts. Also, Riikka Forsström (2012) includes discussed beliefs related to the night more extensively, from nightmarish creatures to ghosts and from vampires to heroes of novels. Nina Edwards (2018) writes of cultural history of darkness, bringing up examples of beliefs from different times and shows how darkness has been dealt with in different stories. She also approaches the topic from the points of religion, sleep, art, and cinema. Jan Garnert (2016) has approached darkness from the point of cultural history of light and illumination, and Alain Cabantous (2009) has written of various aspects of night, street lighting as one. Matthew Beaumont (2016) focuses on nocturnal history of London, and from that perspective, addressing the topic broadly. Similarly, history of the night has approached Gunnar Broberg (2016), but his focus in on Nordic countries. From the humanistic geographical perspective Yi-Fu Tuan (2013) has made some interesting notions of darkness and light, specifically from the point of places, particularly considering the cityscapes. Even though the subject of night, street lightning and nocturnal activities have been research before, I believe my approach to the study of darkness brings a new perspective to the topic.

Nowadays there are several metaphors used to identify darkness in a negative way. For instance, phrases like “go to the dark side” or “we are left in the dark” refer to something negative, as well as meddling with dark magic, and calling an era Dark age, which has a certain connotation. A phrase like “go to the light” is used when talking about eternity and afterlife, implying that darkness is something we need to get out from. So, there seem to be something very human in the ways we portray darkness. We narrate nightly darkness by giving it an active role. Darkness falls, but sometimes it rises or grows. Darkness sneaks and obscures the landscape, leaving visions dim. Darkness hides, conceals, and lurks. Still darkness fades in the light. With our words, beliefs and superstitions we give darkness a power over us, and we might believe it to be more frightening than it should be.

Aside from imagined threats there have been a good reason to be cautious and on guard in the dark. Darkness could hide unexpected objects and obstacles in one’s way - or people, in the worst-case individuals, whose deeds could not bear to be seen in daylight (Garnert, 2016, p. 16). When people gradually began to liberate themselves from the fear of eternal damnation, the fear of the night also began to vanish, and they started to appreciate the nocturnal enchantment (Forsström, 2012, p. 96). The ambivalent nature towards the night can also be seen in the old French proverb, that says “The night is no man’s friend”. However, common people were active at night, some by choice, some by necessity. So, the early modern night cannot be characterize as universally threatening (Koslofsky, 2011, p. 200).

Still the darkness of the night has felt palpable (Ekirch, 2005, p. XXXI). Night have been considered man’s first necessary evil, and our oldest and most haunting terror. People were afraid of what if the sun would not rise again. The idea of total, eternal darkness was frightening (Ekirch, 2005, p. 3). On the other hand, Carleton (2016b, p. 39) has stated that it could be the case of fear of the unknown which could be defined a, or possibly the fundamental fear. Carleton (2016a, p. 5) defines fear of the unknown (FOTU) as, “an individual’s propensity to experience fear caused by the perceived absence of information at any level of consciousness or point of processing”. Edwards (2018) has also mentioned the elusiveness of darkness as a concept and its unfamiliarity. She compares the darkness to looking at the negative of a photograph, it looks familiar and yet not so. There is some bewildering element in that experience, like a déjà vu that forces to see the world anew (p. 27). Darkness divides opinions, since some are afraid of the dark or try at least avoiding it, and many also dislikes darkness, because what it usually appears to stand for. But on the other hand, some are drawn to it because it is considered mysterious and unknown (Edwards, 2018, p. 7).

When considering that those ideas of unfamiliarity and fundamental fear have been in the back of the mind of people through history, it must have affected how people have seen, and experienced darkness and it is no wonder if the darkness was often perceived as being threatening. Later in this article, I will use examples to show how darkness has been observed, and how it has been found to have both frightening and beautiful properties.

Light in the dark

Night has been seen as a border, as a final frontier to be conquered, and night has long defined the length of daylight, since they have been seen as counterparts (Cabantous, 2009, p. 13). Light and darkness, day and night are often thought of as opposites, as two elements which incessantly fight each other (Broberg, 2016, p. 35). Light reveals darkness: flames of the candles, embers, and moonlit seas allow us glimpses to the unlit world (Edwards, 2018, p. 25). The moon and the sun are seen related, they can be siblings, rivals, enemies, lovers, married, opposites (Broberg, 2016, p. 182). For a long time, the night was described without shifts; day was light, night dark (Broberg, 2016, p. 306). Humans need light to understand where we are and what situation we are in. While modern lighting nearly equals daylight, before the 20th century darkness truly began when the sun went down — no light could banish it, only soften its edge (Garnert, 2016, p. 11). In the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries in London and other European cities at night occurred a significant cultural shift. The reason was the emerging of new lighting technologies. At its most basic level, this transformation may be understood through the rise of nightlife, as the streets became ever more animated after nightfall. People for various reasons ventured the city after dark. (Beaumont, 2016, pp. 114–115, see also Koslofsky, 2012, p. 276)

Dialectic of nocturnalization and resistance is best described as a colonization of the urban night. Still the process of nocturnalization was quite different in rural areas, versus in the cities (Koslofsky, 2012, p. 200). In the 19th century the artificial light had a big role in the visual experience of cities. At first it was a case of social problem, because darkness of the cities was a risk, since the shadows of the night could hide criminals and rebels. The artificial light became a way to control, but it also made the cityscapes more theatrical, and people wandering, being a flaneur in the city resembled performing act on stage (Salmi, 2002b, p. 112). Nevertheless, there were also protests towards the artificial lights. One argument was that the light helped evildoers do their work better. Some claimed that gas-lighting attracted people to go out and get drunk, when they did not have to be afraid of the dark nights (Tuan, 2013, p. 129). Even though with the increasing of artificial light only in the twentieth century with the electricity became more common in the cities human beings have altered the diurnal rhythm (Tuan, 2013, p. 216).

So, night is not always completely dark, since the moon, stars, lingering light in dusk, rising light of the dawn and different artificial lights have always been at least somewhat present illuminating the darkness. Dusk and dawn also form an interesting in-between space; they are not completely bright, nor are they completely dark. Edwards (2018) refers dusk and dawn as twilight buffers, halfway stages between dark and light, between night and day (p. 38).

Narrated and experienced darkness

The travel literature offers an interesting source material for the researcher of experiences, because a lot of attention has been paid to the environment during the trip. When travelling, the darkness was encountered in various ways and there are countless descriptions of it in travel journals. Sometimes darkness refers to night or more broadly to those hours of the day without the sun. Now and then it is mentioned when entering a place, such as a cave, thick forest, or inside of churches or inns. I focus on researching stories told by individuals, and language is a great importance when studying narratives. In this article, it has suited well since I read my material searching for specific vocabulary. Narratives contain an interpretation of what has already been experienced but are nevertheless true for the narrator. With this narrative approach I can compare different mentions in relation to each other and as a part of the whole.

During different times and in different cultures darkness have had many connotations. We talk about how sun rises but night falls, and at the morning, we can say that the dawn breaks. So, light appears to be given agency, and dark is left with the role of some sort of accident that entails harm (Edwards, 2018, p. 37). Still, like words drawn from light, words for darkness are found in languages. However, they are often based more on what we do not understand, what we cannot describe. Darkness seems to suggest negative associations for example dishonesty and blind despair, whereas light stands for positive things for instance enlightenment, clarity and hope (Edwards, 2018, p. 25). Edwards (2018) observes that while cultural associations with darkness are rich and varied, linguistic expressions of darkness display notable similarities across languages. In many societies, darkness has often been understood through the concepts of depth and visibility. However, despite these parallels, meanings can be historically and culturally specific—for instance, words denoting darkness may have shifted in meaning over time. Therefore, as she points out, even with comparable vocabularies, cross-cultural comparisons of the concept require caution (pp. 7-11).

Salmi (2002a) writes also of language, stating that the way Western culture uses language has changed considerably over the centuries. The way in which an individual’s feelings and sensations are described has also changed. There are not that many descriptions of feelings in Early Modern literature, but the literature of the Romantic era is full of them (p. 346). The feelings that were recorded are more like impressions, thoughts, or ideas that have arisen from the experience. Momentary immediate feelings rarely leave a trace. However, even the written experiences are real to the experiencer, so from them, immediate feelings can be reached. As Salmi (2002a, p. 346) writes, researcher cannot bypass written source material since they are textual interpretations of sensory impressions.

The study of past emotions is often linked to the history of the senses. How darkness has been experienced involves senses, since when sensory perceptions are registered, they form feelings and emotional states, through which the experiencer mirrors oneself in relation to the environment and gives different meanings to things. Some situations evoke stronger emotional reactions than others. Johnson and Salmi (2013) note that within sensory history, one of the key challenges lies in studying the sensory environment. The focus is on the kinds of impressions the environment enables, not on individual sensory impressions. From the historical sources, one can try to reason, that what kind of stimuli were available in a that environment, although everyday sensations often went unrecorded due to their familiarity. Unusuality of some situations tended to be documented more precisely because their sensory qualities stood out (p. 91).

Perceptions are intersensory, and they can never fully be divided into separate sensory experiences. Language too is intertwined to sensory experiences. One could say that they play well together, complementing each other. There is the meaning within the word, and the word is the external existence of the meaning of sensory experience (Connolly, 2010, p. 182). When studying the experiences of people in the past one must consider the emotional experiences and thereby identify the emotional vocabulary. Boddice (2018) points out the relevance of emotional words and states that contextual analysis of language usage can be most revealing about the meanings and associated experiences of emotion words (p. 35). Rosenwein (2016) has stated that when examining verbalized feelings, the context and the order of the words are important, because they reveal the quality of the feelings. She also writes about emotional sequences, meaning that emotions rarely occur alone. People experience multiple emotions simultaneously. Those emotional sequences are important, they reveal more about overall meanings, depending on what other emotions can be inferred from the whole. Emotions also need a name; without it they are not ready. An emotional vocabulary is necessary for a person to understand, express and feel their feelings. This is why emotion researchers must work with words (pp. 4-9). Plamper (2015) writes about words for emotions that it is worth to examine the use of an emotional vocabulary in several types of official documents (p. 35). He has written about the sources used in the study of emotions. According to him, it is often thought that feelings can only be studied from sources where people talk about their feelings. Plamper continues, that emotions have been discussed in diaries, autobiographies and memoirs, as well as in various letters (pp. 32–33).

So, it depends on the sources, where one can find described feelings and emotions. Although darkness is not an emotion, it is experienced in a multisensory way, leading to a wide range of feelings. As Edwards, who pointed out about a possibility of agency of light, I consider there is the agency of darkness, but how the two entities interact is enlightening. Even though darkness can be defined as a lack of light, light is also a pivotal element when experiencing the darkness. Often, they complement each other. In this article I acknowledge that there is phraseology associated with describing darkness. Darkness is commonly described with certain phrases, but one must keep in mind the possible variation in different cultures and times. And even though there are also similar ways to narrate darkness in different languages, I consider that it is still relevant to analyse these words and phrases, because they contain meanings that have been given to the phenomenon being described.

Traveller’s multisensory experiences

The golden age of travelogues was particularly the 18th and 19th centuries. Descriptions of journeys created expectations and preconceptions and served as a source of inspiration for those planning their own trips (Koivunen et al., 2006, pp. 7–8). In travel literature, the writer records their observations and experiences from their journeys. Hapuli (2005) has emphasized that the essence of travel literature lies in the encounter with the unfamiliar. Travel literature consists of narratives about places and events that the traveller has considered worth observing and describing, and which differ from those found in one’s everyday surroundings. The travel writer thus occupies the position of a curious outsider, observing and interpreting the environment with a sense of wonder and discovery (p. 133). On the same lines, I believe the concept of place is included in travel literature, since travellers described routes, sight, observations, and encountering the unfamiliar. Those encounters were experienced in various places. I argue that by studying travel literature through the emotions evoked by the darkness and nocturnal places I have found experiences that are not repetitions of each other, since not everyone even mentions night-time at all, in their texts, so it forms already a difference.

In destination-oriented cultural tourism, which revolves around specific sites and attractions, the visual sense tends to dominate the tourist experience. Such forms of tourism can therefore be understood as gaze-oriented, where seeing becomes the primary mode through which cultural meaning is perceived and consumed (Selänniemi, 1996, p. 215). Sociologist John Urry in his research of tourism, he has developed the concept of the tourist gaze, which he states is a systematic way of seeing, how and what tourists look at and those different ways of seeing can be described and explained. Urry and his fellow scholar Jonas Larsen (2011) state that tourist is after pleasurable experiences which differ from everyday life, and one part of the experience is to gaze different sceneries, tourists want to see something out of the ordinary. Foreign environment is observed with interest and with a different level of curiosity than surroundings one encountered normally. Urry and Larsen (2011) sums it up writing that we gaze what we encounter (chapter 1). On the same lines Tuan (1974) states, that the tourist’s way of seeing the environment is characterized by freshness and novelty. He points out, that even though the visitor’s perception is often superficial, it is nevertheless valid. Locals don’t observe the surroundings the same way that tourists do. Some things, positive or negative, are not registered by the locals, but the same things become the object of tourist gaze (p. 65).

Eyes are socio-culturally framed and there are various ways of seeing. Everything we gaze have a filter, we gaze through expectations, ideas, and desires, which are framed by social glass, gender, nationality et cetera. However, there is no single tourist gaze, it has always varied, depending on historical period, society and social group, just like there is no universal tourist experience. Tourists gaze differently, and even difference is looked differently (Urry & Larsen, 2011, chapter 1). Darkness makes foreign environment even more foreign. So, when travelling at night, surrounded by nocturnal darkness, without the same way to use sight, to gaze, it changes the experience. I consider that nocturnal environment has been gazed differently and night-time forms a difference, so when researching how nocturnal darkness was experienced by travellers, the idea of tourist gaze can be applied to it. Here can be seen similarities, to what was presented earlier about how darkness has been seen elusive an unfamiliar, something like looking at the negative of a photograph (Edwards, 2018, p. 27). Looking at darkness is like looking something that looks familiar and at the same time it does not.

The sights gazed are often visually objectified or captured through photographs, postcards, films and so on. With those visual representations the gaze is enabled to be reproduced, recaptured and redistributed over time and across space (Urry & Larsen, 2011, chapter 1). Even though the travellers I study made their journeys in different time, before many of the mentioned visual embodiments presented above, I consider the writing, descriptions of what was gazed, are some sort of captures of visual and other kind of experiences. Although tourists may want to see something unusual and they examine landscapes much more intensely in unfamiliar surroundings, few experience places they have not seen or heard about in some way before. Like mentioned earlier, travellers were familiar with other travellers’ descriptions. Also, there were travelogues with pictures in them, for example sketches of landscapes. Intertextuality can also be found in the travel journals, since travellers refer to previous travellers, and what they have recommended worth seeing and experiencing. Blanning (2011) points out that artists painted pictures of Alps for example, just so show others what they missed, if not travelling there (p. 143).

There have been this so-called ‘performance turn’ within tourist studies, in which tourist experiencing places are understood in more multi-sensuous ways as well as understanding the materiality of objects and places, considering them more than just signs (Urry & Larsen, 2011, chapter 1). The same can be applied to the travellers in this article, they have observed the nocturnal environment multisensory way. Still, mainly they have examined their surroundings with gazing, at least when they have encountered the nocturnal scenes. One logical reason to this might be the obscuring nature of the darkness. Because vision has already been somewhat lost, people may try to understand their surroundings even more intensely, looking around and searching for something that helps them understand the situation.

According to Urry and Larsen (2011, chapter 1) there are many different tourist gazes, one example is called the romantic gaze, which can be seen as a solitude, private and a personal. Travellers in my study can sometimes be considered having the romantic gaze, since they are contemplating the moon, stars and falling darkness. Sometimes they romanticize the past, and they feel the history of a place visited and it gives them meaning to the experience. They all were also travelling in the Romantic era, and they were influenced by the conventions of the era. Also, the beauty ideals of the time have assumably affected to the way darkness has been gazed. At the beginning of the modern era, the relationship between Europeans and nature began to change and people began to appreciate the natural landscape. During the Romantic era, from the end of the 18th century onwards, people sought out curiosities, waterfalls, canyons or fear-inspiring natural phenomena, such as storms. The place had to meet the requirements of the sublime, which was part of the era’s concept of beauty. Majestic, picturesque and magnificent views were admired. (Räsänen, 2006, p. 162, see also Kaartinen, 2006, p. 238). Philosopher Edmund Burke (1729–1797) articulated his aesthetic ideas concerning beauty and the sublime in his work and for Burke, the sublime represented the most intense emotion the mind could experience—an overwhelming sensation that combined wonder with an element of terror. Despite this, sublime experience was ultimately pleasurable. He argued that obscurity was essential in transforming ordinary things into sources of fear and awe. Likewise, Burke considered the interplay of extremes—such as darkness and light—as fundamental to the experience of the sublime (2015). Considering this prevailing ideal, I believe that it has influenced travellers’ experiences of the darkness of the night, the light of the moon and stars, and possible experiences of fear.

Urry and Larsen (2011) present also the collective tourist gaze which involves conviviality. Other people also viewing the site are necessary to give liveliness or a sense of carnival or movement (chapter 1). The night, nocturnal hours form interesting difference to this, since usually there were not that many people admiring and gazing the sceneries and sights after dark. On the other hand, sometimes travellers recommended that others visit certain attractions, especially in the moonlight or at dusk, so it might have been possible to encounter others while admiring the nocturnal sites.

About visuality and gaze has also written Salmi (2002b) stating that gaze can repress and humiliate, give messages and communicate. The gaze can also be addressed, and made some targets to it, like monuments or buildings, which are intended to attract the viewer’s attention (p. 112). In pitch-dark there is not that many points to look at, only the darkness itself. But on the other hand, when there has been some light in the dark, the light might have been the target, something to look at in the dark. Also, light have been the one to address the gaze, providing the chance to observe surroundings.

Agency of darkness

Latour (2005) presents the idea, that an actor or actant is something that acts or to which activity is granted by others. An actor is not the source of an action but the moving target of a vast array of entities swarming toward it. When using the word actor, it is not clear, who is acting, like an actor on the stage, who is never alone, there is always other factors involved like audience and stage lighting, backstage crew etc. (p. 46). Latour (2005) states, that an invisible agent must do something, if it does not have any meaning, makes no difference, leaves no trace, or has no value, it is not an agent. Calling something as agent it must have been demonstrated in many ways; you must give account of its operation (p. 53). Jackson (2015) points out Latour’s definition of an actant as anything that is granted to be the source of action. As simply put, an actor can be considered as an entity that does things (p. 31). According to Latour (2005) the agency of objects becomes particularly visible in exceptional situations, moments when the usual way of things or the overall nature of the activity changes, when normally one does not pay much attention to everyday things. One of the examples of those situations have been used of equipment breaking, because then it will be noticed (pp. 79-81).

According to Bennett (2010) there are various questions that are good to think about when researching a matter. One must find appropriate ways to approach the matter and decide how to describe the object being studied without leaving it somehow empty with the description. One approach would require to be foolish and naive in a way to see things in different ways, such as thinking of things as ontologically multiple active matters, some human and some non-human, but all nevertheless material (pp. xiii-xiv). Citing Bennett’s research, Parvén (2013) states that the human relationship with nature could change if we saw material things as alive and active, instead of lifeless and passive. The power of nature should not be underestimated, of which there are numerous examples, like volcanic eruptions, which can demonstrate the fragility of a complex social system through their actions (p. 299).

Even though it is not an object itself, I argue that darkness can be considered an exceptional situation, since it conceals the objects. Normally, at daytime, you do not register a branch on the path in the same way, but in the darkness of the night, things change. I am not saying that night-time or nocturnal darkness are something broken, but I speculate that they can be seen as something different. Darkness breaks the daylight hours; it forms time between two days. I think of darkness as a kind of liminal space, a time between two days, when the hierarchy of the senses changes and a person begin to perceive the surroundings with other senses as well, rather than only with sight. Although that change does not have to be only a threat, an inevitable bad thing, but it altogether acts and makes a difference.

Like I stated earlier, darkness interacts with the surroundings, so darkness is always in some place, affecting on something or someone. I consider this to be in line with the sensual-emotional perspective used in humanistic geography which emphasizes the experience of a place through the senses and emotions. Erkkilä (2008) states that this perspective considers that there is a close connection between the place and the experiencer, so they cannot be separated without consequences. The sensory-emotional perspective does not consider place as a limited space, but rather as an experienced place, seen as something broader than just boundaries drawn on a map (pp. 203–204). Therefore, this perspective supports my approach to the environment transformed by nocturnal darkness marking it as experienced place.

Latour (2005) argues that objects must be reintroduced into the normal course of action, as they too possess agency. It is evident in everyday language: kettles boil water, knives cut food, and hammers drive nails. Our language attributes agency through action verbs. Latour further contends that if we begin from the controversies surrounding actors and agency, then anything that alters a situation by making a difference qualifies as an actor—or, if not yet defined as such, an actant. The essential question, therefore, is whether an entity affects the course of another’s action. According to Latour, it is difficult to deny this, since one cannot claim that a nail could be driven without a hammer or that water could boil without a kettle (pp. 70-71). With this transformation darkness has an influence, there has been an act which involved the travellers and the nocturnal darkness and thereby created an experience. I propose the idea that nocturnal darkness that travellers encountered in the light of the Latour’s theory can be interpreted as an actant, since it acts with other entities. Darkness conceals the path, darkness falls over, darkness obscures the vision et cetera, making a difference to other agent’s actions. Also, the effect darkness has to the light and vice versa shows them actants, thus having an agency. Furthermore, the role of the language is present in the Latour’s theory as well, emphasizing its importance when studying the agency of things.

In the middle of the darkness

British travellers I focus on this article journeyed through continental Europe to Italy. That was very common route during the period I concentrate on. The travel narratives were meant to be published, so there were also the potential readers to consider when travellers described their experiences. Using similar phrases as other travel writers, was justified because it made it easier for readers familiar with travel literature to better understand the experiences on the trip, as the vocabulary was already recognizable. Readers could easily follow along and visualize all the things they read from travel narratives.

Jane Waldie Watts née Waldie (1793–1826) wrote Sketches Descriptive of Italy (1820) and her sister Charlotte Anne Eaton née Waldie (1788–1859) published her letters from Rome as the book Rome in the Nineteenth Century (1822), both books were published in several volumes. From Eaton I have used volume 1 (1822) and volume 2 (1852). The sisters were travelling together, and their brother accompanied them for some part of the journey. Eaton’s and Waldie’s writing style were influenced by Romanticism and its aesthetic ideals. Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley née Godwin (1797–1851) travelled with her husband Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822). Both were writers, Mary Shelley wrote several notable novels, travel books and helped editing her husband’s works and Percy Bysshe Shelley is considered one of the major English Romantic poets. Their travel journal was published as a book History of a six weeks’ tour through a part of France, Switzerland, Germany and Holland (1817). However, Percy Shelley has written poem, preface and two letters, but the rest of the text was primarily written and organised by Mary Shelley. From Mary Shelley I have used also another travel narrative called Rambles in Germany and Italy, in 1840, 1842, and 1843 (1844). During this journey, Mary Shelley travelled in company of her son.

To this article I have chosen these travellers because I have familiarised myself with their travel experiences in my previous research, and I considered their description from journeys would be interesting to explore further. The one thing that connects these travellers is that they all travelled in Italy, although they also describe their experiences on the way there too. Since they travelled in same area, it helps to compare their descriptions of darkness, because darkness can be experienced differently in different environments and climates.

I will now focus to several quotes and travel journal entries from travellers presented above. These examples show the various ways in which they wrote about darkness giving an idea how the darkness was encountered, for instance gazed, and how it was experienced. Also, the examples show that at least sometimes there is an agency given to darkness.

By the time we reached San Secondo, evening was beginning to close in; and, as there was some awkwardness about getting the carriage across in the dark when the river was so swelled, we were obliged to remain there all night. (Waldie, 1820, p. 227)

From the quote it can be read, that darkness made the situation awkward, obscuring the river. Waldie’s choice of word awkward reveals her feeling. Also, the way she has mentioned the evening, which was closing in, gives an idea of something unpleasant. She gives darkness and evening an active role, since they have a power to affect the outcome of the situation, and they also show the negative feeling she feels towards them. On some occasions, there was total darkness, and it was described as perfectly dark in contrast to the light of the day. Waldie describes how they arrived at a town in the evening, and early next morning they boarded the boat by lantern-light, and she writes that “When we set out, it was perfectly dark; but the moment the dawn did commence, it was almost instantly day” (Waldie, 1820, p. 27). Maybe the darkness was not perfect in her mind, but it formed such a complete contrast to the dawn, that she underlines the dark. At one time Waldie (1820) describes some star-light morning, as they continued travelling, she does not mention darkness in her description, but the feeling towards the daylight and the sun can be reached and she describes the sun in very human terms writing how dawn appeared, stars vanished, and the sun rose to revivify them with his rays. Waldie continues her description mentioning how this bright luminary had left the travellers to go enlighten another hemisphere, and in the meantime, they had been travelling, shivering, dining, sleeping, dressing and breakfasting during the period of his absence (p. 199). From the way she writes I make a conclusion that at least in that situation she would have preferred to travel in daylight.

Shelley wrote " I sit writing at a window till twilight is thickening into darkness" (Shelley, 1844, p. 70). At that situation she just waits news, if the boat will come, so travellers can continue their journey. They had already spent some time on that place and were eager to proceed. In this description as well the agency given to an entity can be found. This time it is twilight, and with its thickening, it turns to darkness. Also, during the same journey, she has written a long description in where she describes night and its celestial lights. The purity of the atmosphere gives the darkness a radiance, a brilliancy, which causes the darkness to interact with other elements or entities in the environment. She also describes the moon, whose light is painfully bright, and how it fatigues the eye more than daylight. To her, as she writes, the evening hours are so enchanting since she is a lover of nature (Shelley, 1844, pp. 276–277). So, one can assume, that nocturnal environment was pleasurable to her. Here I see some influence of the Romantic era also, even though this time the moon is not appraised.

In her text Eaton mentions how “night closed upon us” (Eaton, 1822, p. 59). I conclude that she was specifically describing the darkness of the night that was falling, and by that choice of words, she gives nocturnal darkness an active role. Although, as noted earlier, it is a common verb to use in such situation, it still paints a specific picture of the moment and highlights her experience with darkness. Eaton has also described a sunset over the ruins of Colosseum, and she has written “the shades of evening rapidly closed around”, and further she continues telling how the moon arose and an evening star lighted her glowing lamp over the ruins. She mentions how “the still, pale moonbeam fell on the lines of its projecting columns, range above range, to the lofty attic, in silvery light, leaving the black arches in mysterious darkness” (Eaton, 1852, p. 390). So, even though she gives an impression, that the darkening evening closed around, thus implying that the experience was not pleasant, the light of the moon and star came to guide them and beneath their mingled rays, they could continue marvelling the sight. Based on this description, I conclude that because of the influence of light, darkness has become mysterious, meaning once again that two things together influence each other, potentially revealing each other’s agency, thus being in line with theory of network of relationships between different actants.

Evening fades into darkness in Waldie’s description and it gives a feeling that darkness is also something final, some whole, something that when others encounter it, makes them fade away (Waldie, 1820, p. 290). In a one longer entry in her text Waldie describes it quite well how darkness of the night was palpable, and I consider that darkness is given an active role since Waldie writes “darkness overtook us” and she continues describing the situation they were and states that they had to trust the mules more than themselves and the night was become so dark, that no object whatever was discernible. She also mentions the thunder and flashes from lightning that only served to bewilder their sight and obscure the light of the stars, which would otherwise have illuminated their path. Waldie narrate how they could not even distinguish each other in the middle of the darkness, and the only way they kept together was because their mule-drivers kept shouting at each other (Waldie, 1820, pp. 161–163). So, sometimes the light in the middle of the darkness was experienced even worse than complete darkness, because of the contrast. Waldie continues to describe their journey through the same night and from this quote can be read the effect that light has to darkness, which activates it to appear even more dark, when she wrote about the lightning.

At this time we would willingly have dispensed with its flashes, beautiful as they were, for they served only to mark the "palpable obscure; “making the intervals appear much darker…”. (Waldie, 1820, pp. 161–163)

In studying the experiences of the past, part of the challenge is the researcher herself and her preconceptions. As stated earlier, darkness has always been feared at some level at least, because it is considered a primeval fear. So that fear might affect how the researcher interprets the sources and the text in them. For example, Shelley wrote that “darkness approached our valley from behind the Alps” (Shelley & Shelley, 1817, p. 98) it is possible, that the first impression of darkness might feel intimidating. Also, other preconceptions, as well as the used language shape the way how the matter is interpreted. If somebody had described that the daylight approaches, it could create a different image and might make it seem like a more positive experience. I might interpret the matter in a certain way as a researcher myself, when the object of research is a matter that often has negative connotations.

Eaton describes the beautiful scenery around her and from her text her attitude towards darkness of the night in that situation can be interpreted. She describes how “a parting gleam of the setting sun burst from the sky, bathing the landscape in one flood of yellow brightness, and lighting up every object with sudden enchantment”. She continues to describe how “we turned from this scene as its transient brightness was fading away, plunged into the darkness of the woods, and night closed in upon us” (Eaton, 1822, pp. 80–81). Eaton’s choice of word when mentioning how they continued their journey after the enchanted sun had set and night closed upon them gives an idea that night was not that wonderful in that moment, when everything was turning dark, and they had to continue their way through it. Also, the verb plunged has certain connotations towards darkness.

During their journey Shelley have described the evening, and there is mentioning how “the laden clouds made the darkness almost as deep as that of midnight” (Shelley & Shelley, 1817, p. 29). The role of clouds in intensifying the darkness is interesting, clouds and darkness acting together, one affecting the other like in Latour’s theory of actors. Shelley mentions the darkness of the clouds again later in her journey. She has described their journey in the evening, which had closed in, and they proceeded by the light of stormy moon. When they were on a steep serpentine road the surroundings were hardly seen, since everything was “filled by darkness of the driving clouds” (Shelley & Shelley, 1817, p. 88).

In the use of words describing agency of darkness also the simple verb coming can be found Shelley’s writing, indicating the active role of darkness. She describes how in one evening, when the sun had already descended “the snow pelting against the windows of our carriage, assisted the coming darkness” and they continue mentioning how it deprived their view to the Lake Geneva (Shelley & Shelley, 1817, p. 92). The role of the snow assisting the coming darkness is intriguing and again creates an image of cooperation between two entities. In one journal entry Shelley describes a night when there was one of the finest storms they had ever seen, the lightning had lit up the lake, and they could see the trees in its light. She mentions how “all the scene illuminated for an instant, when a pitchy blackness succeeded, and the thunder came in frightful bursts over our heads amid the darkness” (Shelley & Shelley, 1817, p. 100). Again, here can be seen the interactions between entities, but also how light of the lightning and thunder was felt frightfully. Shelley also has one description where she mentions “the darkness of night had swallowed up the objects” (Shelley & Shelley, 1817, p. 132). This example is very descriptive and paints a picture of the situation. Darkness of night had done something concrete; choice of verb swallow makes the act almost tangible.

Conclusion

This article has drawn on phenomenological perspective of experience focusing on multisensory experiences of darkness. The emotions and experiences that darkness have evoked have influenced the meanings darkness was given. This study has also taken its cue from ontology, and I have searched from the travel narratives the experiences that shows what kind of agency darkness was given. However, I am aware that the experiences are influenced by the aesthetic ideals of the era, the conventions of travel literature, and the phraseology associated with describing darkness, and thus do not in themselves add any special meaning to the experience, I argue that they nevertheless reveal the traveller’s experience of the darkness of night and provide clues about the agency given to darkness.

Person’s relationship with darkness is often twofold, because although darkness can arouse fear and make one feel threatened, on the other hand, it can appear atmospheric and thus delight the experiencer. So, darkness was not automatically experienced as a bad thing. Sometimes it was seen inconvenient or even dangerous, since it was more difficult to travel and see the path, but often it was considered beautiful. This is especially emphasized in those descriptions, when darkness is lightened with moon or stars.

I have focused on experiences of darkness in certain situations and places, which have been experienced through senses and emotions. The meanings given to darkness were case-specific, and they were often influenced by light. The role of light in the experience of darkness is significant and there is a constant interaction between them. They are not enemies but counterparts who complement each other, two entities and actants which have agency. But this interaction involves also the observer, the experiencer and the place, where all happens. Sometimes experiencers have hoped that the darkness surrounds them, and that it is not illuminated even by the moonlight or the flashings of the storm or penetrated with a light of the lamp, making the darkness outside of the light even more palpable. Darkness has also felt comforting, safe, offering a good hiding place. Travellers have described their experiences, thereby giving agency to darkness and emphasizing its role as an actant. Darkness is part of nature, part of the circadian rhythm, so darkness also functions without humans. However, people are required to experience and verbalize the experience to discover the meanings they have given to darkness. So, what this article also points out is that the darkness cannot be viewed only in itself, there is an interaction between the darkness and the experiencer of darkness, the one who has described the darkness and thus contributed to the fact that darkness has gained agency. However, one could ponder whether darkness might have agency even without interference of people, our interpretations. This would make an interesting topic for further research to investigate whether darkness has agency without interaction with humans.

The fact that travellers in this study were all women, was not an essential point. More relevant was, that they came from similar backgrounds, all being from wealthy families and pretty much the same age. Although I have not focused on the gender or age of the travellers in this article, it can be assumed that these factors have nevertheless had an impact on the experiences of darkness.

Darkness has agency, it is an actant, when thinking of ontological way and approaching it by using Latour actor network theory. Darkness either seems to break the light of the day or is itself broken by the nocturnal light falling from the sky, by other light sources, or in some cases, some other factor has affected the situation and darkened the scene. The effect of darkness is highlighted at moments when traveller, the experiencer of the situation, cannot see well and this has affected the journey. Or when the light of the moon or stars acts as a co-actor with the darkness, emphasizing the significance of darkness as an actant. Also, the interaction with other entities, such as clouds or snow has been significant.

My argument is, since darkness has been experienced and described as something that conceals, falls, closes upon, spreads, and overtakes surroundings and situations, darkness can be seen as an entity, as a matter, which affects everything around it and vice versa, and when doing so, reveals different meanings. Darkness makes things happen; it makes a difference. So, my conclusion is that darkness has been given agency by the travellers.