La montagna tra educazione e avventura nei Voyages en zigzag di Rodolphe Töpffer (1799–1846)

In the first half of the 19th century, Rodolphe Töpffer, educator and illustrator from Geneva, organised adventure journeys through the Alps for the boys who studied at his boarding school. He documented their experiences in illustrated diaries published under the title Voyages en zigzag. There, he described a picturesque and sublime mountain environment, typical of the romantic spirit of the time. Töpffer was one of the first to see the mountains as a world particularly congenial to education, as it entails giving up the comforts of city life and urges courage, team spirit and solidarity. For the author, the alpine environment is also the ideal backdrop for developing in pupils a passion for studying nature through free and independent observation, in the wake of a centuries-old pedagogical school of thought.