Taming the Sublime in Darkest Africa: Stanley's How I Found Livingstone and Burton's Lake Regions of Central Africa‪.‬

This essay explores how African natives and African landscapes are written in the register of the sublime and how different types of rhetorical appropriation are used to "tame" such apparently dangerous threats to British colonial rule. Writing about Africa as a menacing and perilous space, yet one that they ultimately manage to navigate safely, is crucial for Stanley and Burton, for it allows them to assert control over their environment and to use the sublime to establish an aesthetic sanction for the values and prejudices underwriting imperialism, exploration, and British cultural hegemony. **********