Imagining Humboldt: biography, stalking and leaving the family

Some historical figures are resurrected more regularly than others in disciplinary histories. Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859), a Prussian aristocratic traveller-scientist, polyglot and polymath, is one of the ghosts that haunts geographical history. In this chapter, I discuss how such recurring tales of exploration and adventure, recounted in biographies, might continue to hold us back from developing new critical scholarship. In order to do this, I explore (1) the role played by biography in disciplinary histories; (2) the specific use of biography in geographical history; (3) why thinking about biography as a form of stalking – a pathological form of obsession with a chosen figure – might help us to move forward in understanding how Humboldt has been imagined. Throughout this discussion, I focus on the idea of ownership, on the claiming of another for oneself, and the particular dynamics that take place between biographers and their alter-egos in the absence of any possibility of consent by the latter.