Abstract
This chapter explores the transformative power of transatlantic travel by focusing on Catharine Maria Sedgwick’s 1839 trip to Europe, which she chronicles in Letters from Abroad (1841). The extended tour ignited in the aging author a rediscovery of her own girlhood, and her tales of literary tourism recount the ways US citizens understand their own national identity by devising narratives of youthfulness in relation to—and often times at odds with—their Old World counterparts. By focusing on how Sedgwick’s travels help her to reflect on youth, we uncover the way she balances her maturity with the dreams of her own young nation and the possibility it holds for future development.