1994 Articles

Embodying Oriental Women: Representation and Voyeurism in Montesquieu, Montagu and Ingres

Dobie, Madeleine

This paper is a reading of three instances of the image of oriental woman in works of the eighteenth and nineteenth century, in other words, works set against the backdrop of at fIrst nascent and later full·blown Colonialism. They are Montesquieu's Lettres persones, (probably begun in 1717 and finally published in 1721), Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's Embassy Letters, the manuscript of her correspondence with friends and literary acquaintances in England, when, from 1717-1718, she accompanied her husband, ambassador to the Sublime Porte, and lastly, lngres' Bain turc of 1863.