Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Harems of the Mind: Passages of Western Art and Literature

Harems of the Mind: Passages of Western Art and Literature

Yeazell, Ruth Bernard

Paperback

Art HistoryLiterary CriticismMiddle Eastern Art

ISBN10: 030019871X
ISBN13: 9780300198713
Publisher: Yale University Press
Published: Sep 1 2000
Pages: 328
Weight: 1.16
Height: 0.78 Width: 6.14 Depth: 9.21
Language: English
Fascinating and mysterious, the idea of the harem long captured the imagination of the West. The Muslim practice of concealing the women of the household from the eyes of alien men tempted Europeans to extravagant projections of their own wishes and fears. This intriguing book examines the art that resulted. Drawing on a wide range of evidence from the late seventeenth century to the early twentieth century - including travel writing, literature, painting, and even opera - Ruth Bernard Yeazell demonstrates the surprising variety of expressions inspired by the harem of the Western imagination. The book provides both a rich account of changing perceptions of the harem and a demonstration of the tenacious persistence of myth and stereotype. Yeazell shows that Europe's hunger for facts about the harem combined repeatedly with the impulse to fantasize. Masculine erotic fantasies of the harem were reflected in the paintings of Ingres and Delacroix, the writings of de Sade, Byron and Loti, and the work of anonymous pornographers. Alternate representations portrayed the harem as a prison or a locus of freedom, a place of murderous rivalry or a home of loving sisterhood, a chamber of erotic licence or a nightmarish snare of frustration and ennui. And Montesquieu, Mozart and Charlotte Bronte among others explored in their art the opposition of the imaginary pleasures of the harem to the freely chosen union of a loving couple. In a nuanced reading of Ingres's 'Bain turc' and other works, Yeazell concludes that for some the appeal of the harem lay in the fantasy of eluding time and death. Ruth Bernard Yeazell is Chace Family Professor of English and director of the Lewis Walpole Library at Yale University.

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