Reconstruction of the Character of Scheherazade - Essay Example

Reconstruction of the Character of Scheherazade Introduction How the Arab women are viewed with regard to their femininity, culture and lifestyle has received a lot of attention in literature by scholars from the Arab countries as well as Westerners who have attempted to interpret the life of these women. The Arabian Nights and the Tales of Scheherzade have been reinterpreted by several authors, artists, musicians and film makers. The Arabian Nights’s protagonist Scheherzade distracts the attention of her new husband, the Sultan, and manages to buy her life night after night by holding him spell bound with her engaging stories. Historically, Scheherzade, has been considered the embodiment of bravery who used the power of her words to save her life, but with the passage of time, Scheherzade has been stereoptyped as an exotic, sexual, vulnerable woman. The reason for this is attributed to the images proliferated by media and artists. They have portrayed Scheherzade as totally contrary to what she actually embodies in the Arabian Nights. The popularity of this reconstructed image of Scheherzade has been further extended to all Arab women and has deeply affected the perceptions not only of what Westerners believe about Arab women but the Arabs themselves. This paper discusses why the Western interpretation is so narrow with regard to the concepts of orientalism, othering, inequality, alienation and culture with regard to the character of Scheherzade. Through the character of Scheherzade it discusses the Westernized representation of Arab women. This paper also attempts to reveal the contrariness in western view on the concept of oppression since it is popularly believed that Arab women are oppressed, and discusses what oppression really means. It also discusses the differences in gender roles and the how women of East differ from the women of West. As pointed by Said “the West has long evinced an enduring fascination with the harem and the veil, recurring tropes in Orientalist literature that symbolize Muslim women's oppression and eroticism simultaneously” (Cited by Weber, Unveiling Scheherazade: Feminist Orientalism in the International Alliance of Women). It attempts to understand who really is oppressed and alienated - the Arab woman or the western women locked by her seemingly liberated lifestyle. This subject has also received considerable attention in Mernissi’s Scheherzade Goes West and Mernissi’s keen understanding on this subject has been used to gain better insight into this subject. The Orientalist Perspective Said, US Orientalism explains “Orient” as an entire system of thought and scholarship. When speaking of Orientalist a male is considered as feminine, weak, and still possibly dangerous because he poses a threat to white, Western women. The Oriental woman is perceived as both eager to be dominated and exotic. The Oriental is the person represented by such thinking. The Oriental is a stereoptype that exists across cultures. When West conquered the East, their explanation and understanding of the East led to the rise of Orientalist scholars and how they constructed the Orient itself. The discourse and visual images of Orientalism are associated with power and superiority, the original purpose of which was to further the colonizing mission of the West on the East. It is argued that since the idea of the Orient is created by the Orientalist, it exists purely for him or her. Its identity is defined by the scholar who describes it. Orientalism is thus linked to Western interpretation of the East, including Scheherzade and the Arabian Nights (Sered, Orientalism, http://www.english.emory.edu/Bahri/Orientalism.html). It has perpetuated several false stereotypes about Eastern Women and especially the women from Middle East and holds on to the view of “East as a mishmash of religious excess, superstition and despotism… whereas conventional wisdom holds that the West stands for truth, good and justice” (Sullivan, Events Exhibits reveal bias of Orientalism). According to (Lynee, Women as Portrayed in Orientalist Painting) from the 1700s to the 1920s The Arabian Nights, enjoyed considerable, and enduring success in the West. While the tales had a strong spirituality, they came to be recognized more for their theme of sexuality, love, violence, humour and guile which guided the perception of the Eastern World as being poetical, erotic and violent. The caliphs, vizirs, odalisques and eunuchs found in these tales became clichés in the Orientalist repertoire. The most influential performance inspired by The Arabian Nights was the Russian ballet Schéhérazade, presented in Paris by Serge Diaghilev in 1910. “The exotic splendours of the costumes and decors by Léon Bakst, with their violent colour combinations—emerald and orange, indigo and geranium, vermilion and rose—were a revelation to the audience, who were used to muted pastel tones. Never had a Western public been exposed to anything like these orgiastic colours and frenetic leaps, this exotic sensuality” (Lynee, Women as Portrayed in Orientalist Painting) The view of Craig (the English scholar) offers a very enlightening perspective on the Orientalist interpretation of Scheherzade. Carig’s Orientalism is considered theoretical in nature and he produced his own views in the art of the theatre (cited by Taxidou, Mask: A Periodical Performance by Edward Gordon). He has not produced clearly Orientalist works like Diaghilev’s Scheherzade which relies on Western reconstruction of Scheherzade. The Oriental appears as a theme and as style, not as theatrical reference in these performances. In fact Eurpean Orientalism as a modern style, as a trend is even criticised in The Mask. The Orient for Craig was too sacred to set the new style which occurred in fine art and popular fashion. Scheherzade, the theatrical production uses the Oriental myth of despotism, hedonism and decadence which projects “the image of the Orient as Europe’s other”. It relies very little on Oriental theatrical modes. Craig rightly views these as imitation, which is his main criticism against Russian Ballets (Taxidou, Mask: A Periodical Performance by Edward Gordon). The tales of Arabian Nights introduced Westerners to “harem” for whom it became “associated with euphoria without constraints” (Mernissi, Scheherzade Goes West). Mernissi presents a well documented and researched comparison of the two kinds of harems - the Western harem and the Islamic harem. The difference between the westerner’s perception of harem versus that of East as explained by Mernissi (Scheherzade Goes West ) was that “the Westerner’s harem was an orgiastic feast where men benefited from a true miracle: receiving sexual pleasure without resistance or trouble from the women they had reduced as slaves. In Muslim harems, men expect their enslaved women to fight back ferociously and abort their schemes for pleasure… the journalists always described the harem as a voluptuous wonderland drenched with heavy sex provided by vulnerable nude women who were happy to be locked up. […] In both miniatures and literature, Muslim men represent women as active participants, while Westerners such as Matisse, Ingres, and Picasso show them as nude and passive”. The Orientalist illusion is aggravated by the exotic world of Arabian Nights which is thought to represent the strange and true customs of the East (Sallis, Scheherezade through the Looking Glass: The Metamorphosis of the Thousand and One Nights) According to Abdo (Narrating Little Fatima: A Picture is Worth 1001 Tales — “Multiple Critique” in Fatima Mernissi’s Dreams of Trespass: Tales of a Harem Girlhood , http://www.imageandnarrative.be/autofiction/abdo.htm) ‘the erotic, exotic and the downright strange are emphasized in words like “Scheherazade,” “Caliph,” and “Co-Wife.” While the packaging initially invites “Western eyes,” it turns off the Muslim and/or Arab reader who is likely to think at first glance that this is just another one of “those books” by the “sell-outs” who cater to Western ideas for profit and momentary notoriety’. Mernissi’s, Dreams of Tresspass for instance forces a western audience to “see the Arab world without the not-so-rosy glasses of Orientalist and colonial discourse. For English-speaking Arab and Muslim readers it means becoming aware of the damage that religious, national and cultural discourses impose on women” (Narrating Little Fatima: A Picture is Worth 1001 Tales — “Multiple Critique” in Fatima Mernissi’s Dreams of Trespass: Tales of a Harem Girlhood , http://www.imageandnarrative.be/autofiction/abdo.htm) Othering Othering refers to the think about social or psychological ways in which one group excludes or marginalizes others. Others, as a term distinguishes what is being referred to as dissimilar from stereotypical images. In social sciences it is used to understand the process by which societies and groups exclude others they wish to subordinate or who do not fit in their society. For instance Edwards Said’s book on Orientalism explains othering as what was done by western societies, especially England and France, to “other” the people in the Orient who they wished to control (Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Other). The concept of 'otherness' also applies to how identities are perceived, as people construct roles for themselves in relation to an 'other'. It may not necessarily be related to subjugation, but result from an action-reaction. The concept of “other” is also explained from a feminist perspective. It pertains to the view that the Western women hold of the Arab women who are considered the “other”. The Arabian Night tales as reconstructed by the West and how women in these tales are perceived, has had its influence in perpetuating the myth of the Muslim woman as : veiled, demure and suppressed. This myth according to Rana (Unveiling the Myth of Muslim Women, http://www.chowk.com/articles/10142) can be traced back through the literature and art of Colonial times that helped perpetuate the image of the “otherness” of the Muslim woman. The myth lives on in the media today. But despite this, the Western feminists still buy it. For instance, According to Weber (http://www.accessmylibrary.com/coms2/summary_0286-10432537_ITM Unveiling Scheherazade: Feminist Orientalism In The International Alliance Of Women) the Western who are the as the inferior ‘Other Within’ Western societies when European women artists and travelers to who observed the Middle East they spoke about the ‘Other without’ that differed from hegemonic notions of the Orient but that still affirmed the basic separation between West and East. It lends a view on how Western women (European and American) who criticised their own societies viewed the Oriental “other’s” veil and harem as oppressive. They described these entities as oppressive without understanding what these historical institutions truly meant and implied. It is interesting to note how the Western woman’s perception of the veil seen as oppressive without understanding its meaning plays on the Muslim woman for whom it is a matter of choice in her social interaction if she lives in the Western world. The Arab woman ends up paying the price for the attitude of the Western woman, who cannot understand why someone who has the freedom not to wear the hijab would decide to wear it. They treat her as someone who does not understand her freedom to choose (Rana, Unveiling the Myth of Muslim Women, http://www.chowk.com/articles/10142) These notions have been challenged by Mernissi (cited by Abdo, http://www.imageandnarrative.be/autofiction/abdo.htm) who in Dreams of Trespass through Yasmina, her maternal grandmother and the strongest feminist voice in the text states that ‘ “when a woman worked hard, and was not making money, she was stuck in a harem, even though she did not see its walls” (63). These words reveal a dimension of the photograph at the beginning of “The Harem Within”... Who is looking up from the courtyard imprisoned in that invisible harem? Is it the well-meaning but misguided working mother or housewife of Europe and America, who, feeling sorry for those women of Islam as she looks up from the book, perhaps begins to notice the confining walls of her own anti-feminist world? The image reveals how easily one can internalize or construct the harem within”’. A title in Mernissi’s Dreams of Trespass book called the “French Harem” describes how harem is not just an Arab women’s experience. Abdo, (http://www.imageandnarrative.be/autofiction/abdo.htm) points out: “Women's experiences are comparable, Mernissi contends, whether the similarities are acknowledged or not. …living in a place of explicit rules (like an actual, physical harem) can be “easier” than living in an invisible one, wherein learning the rules can only happen by trial and error”’ Inequality The inequality between men and women, the colonizer and colonised, East and West are in one way or another associated with the tales from Arabian Nights. The Western reconstruction of Scheherzade has the world believe that the Arab women is inferior and passive in status compared to the Arab male who is fearless and dominating. This perception however is misplaced. The king in Scheherzade was not really fearless but in fact fearful of the woman’s disloyalty. The extent of his fear was such that he resorted to marrying a new woman and killing her at dawn. The act of sex with the woman does not make the king more dominant or more powerful than Scheherzade, infact it is Scheherzade who emerges more powerful and dominating as she “penetrates his brain” (Gill, Harem Scarum, http://www.memphisflyer.com/memphis/Content?oid=oid%3A1138 ) and with the “capacity to outthink and outwit the king, remains sexually attractive to the king”. Mernissi in Scheherzade Goes West also points out that historically powerful Muslim men enjoyed the company of educated witty women and found this seductive as opposed to the Western men’s perception. According to Gill, Harem Scarum, http://www.memphisflyer.com/memphis/Content?oid=oid%3A1138) “a man in love risks slavery, therefore locking women up makes rejection impossible”. Mernissi (Scheherzade Goes West) talks of the Eastern idea of women having wings and that "only desperately fragile men who are convinced that women have wings could create such a drastic thing as the harem, a prison that presents itself as a palace". The Arab men are fearful and hence hold on to their women. In Islamic culture, the harem is seen as the site of a dangerous, sexual power struggle in which powerful women resist male domination. An idea well revealed in the Arabian Nights. Merinssi (Scheherzade Goes West) also insinuates that Western men do not believe that women have wings to fly away and hence there is no need to keep them under control. This is in line with the idea that Western men were influenced by Kant who said that women should never study mathematics history or geography as this knowledge would destroy their beauty. Western men seem to depict themselves as confident and fearlessly masculine, and so “the tragic dimension so present in Muslim harems- fear of women and male self-doubt- is missing in the Western harem” (Mernissi, Scheherzade Goes West, 16).Mernissi further describes the accepted role of women in Arab Society. She states ““Growing up, I was taught that a woman should lower her gaze, so that men could never know her thoughts” (Mernissi, Scheherzade Goes West). But she also emphasizes that women are not considered inferior and are infact brought up with a sense of equality, which is the reason why Muslim women leaders are not uncommon even in the extremist world. Identity Huff-Rouselle, (http://www.mernissi.net/civil_society/portraits/fatimamernissi.html, A Contemporary Scheherazade's Tales of a Borderless World) states that “Scheherazade reigns as the mythical queen of Arabic literature, not because of her physical beauty (which is taken for granted), but because she combined creativity with the shrewdest intelligence”. In the original Arabian Nights, Scheherzade’s body is hardly referred to, but several references exist that emphasize her learning. However in the ballet, originally choreographed by Sergey Diaghilev, Scheherzade is depicted as sensual and voluptuous. But over the years how her character has been reconstructed focuses more on the physical aspects of her beauty, disregarding her keen intellect. There is significance attached to this fact of how Scheherzade’s beauty is perceived and how it undermines her accomplishments. It explains how Arab women’s identities are defined and society’s perception shaped about the women from the East. It plays a role in establishing gender relationships and dominating the social discourse and most important of all, defining the identity of women. Merinssi ( Hariharan, Scheherzade’s Story, http://www.telegraphindia.com/1050821/asp/opinion/story_5097657.asp) argues that “if the original Scheherazade had nothing more than this to offer, what would have happened to her? Mernissi is very sure she would have been killed if she had disrobed like a Hollywood vamp or Matisse’s odalisque and stretched out passively on the king’s bed. This man was not looking for sex, he was looking for a psychotherapist. What Scheherazade had to do was disarm a killer with dialogue, not seduce; something any of the women who went before her could have done”. Scheherzade was the civilizing agent, who convinced the king that reason was more effective than violence. Scheherzade needed three key skills, namely, control over a vast store of information, ability to clearly grasp the criminal’s mind and the determination to act in cold blood. Her first skill was intellectual, she had the power of poetry, knowledge of the sayings of the wise and the ability to mould the narrative and content. She did not draw on knowledge alone, but applied her gift of psychology that could change a criminal’s mind by using words alone. This has been likened by (Hariharan, Scheherzade’s Story) as to how a trained specialist would speak to an anti social person holding a hostage. Scheherzade was thus essentially a strategist, who was sharp and could correctly gauge the king’s reaction, or the next move as she talked into the night. She also had to stay very brave and keep her fear under control so that she would never lose her listener’s interest, who would then perhaps revert to killings. Scheherzade performed a “cerebral seduction” rather than a “physical seduction”(Mernissi- Beyond the Veil). In every interaction with the king in the night, it is Scheherzade, who takes the lead, between her and the king in their harem-prison. It is a contradictory notion, considering that it was she who was the prisoner, the subject and the woman and all three identities have associations with subjugation. Mernissi has also argued that the presentation of a sensual woman is based on the idea that an intellectual woman may be less feminine to a Western man and this is based on the philosophy of Immanuel Kant. Learning, Kant’s philosophy says destroys the woman’s charms over the opposite sex.Mernissi describes that this is the position that Western men take to dominate women. By only focusing on the physical beauty of Scheherzade, Western reconstruction of her character has only perpetuated what Noami Wolf calls the “beauty myth” which she states is a false ideal that is used to oppress women sexually, economially nad politically. The beayty myth undermines the progress made by feminism and women in general. Wolf states “the surgical technologies of breast implants and face lifts are believed to be designed to institute medical control of women. The diet, cosmetics, and cosmetic surgery industries combined... are said to stem from the need to keep women in line. Standards of beauty, the argument goes, are arbitrary -- capriciously linked with age, highly variable across cultures, not universal in nature, and hence not a function of evolution”. But women have their own individuality and they make their own choices. They are not passive individuals who will buy into whatever is being offered. . In contrast an evolutionary psychological approach shows that women have far more autonomy and choice in their deployment of attraction tactics than proponents of the beauty myth would have us believe.... Women purchase beauty products not because they have been brainwashed by the media, but rather because they determine that their power to get what they want will be increased." (Buss, The Evolution of Desire, 1994, p. 113) Mernissi (Scheherzade Goes West) describes how in America being “size 6” is considered as the norm. Women are under pressure to diet and stay this size to be considered attractive and youthful. Mernissi argues that this is a “more violent restriction imposed on women than is the Muslim veil”. She compares the Western harem to the one created by the Muslim man. While the Muslim man uses space to dominate by excluding women from public arena, the Western man manipulates time and light – “by putting the spotlight on the female child and framing her as the ideal of beauty, he condemns the mature woman to invisibility. In fact, the modern Western man enforces Immanuel Kant's nineteenth-century theories: to be beautiful, women have to appear childish and brainless. When a woman looks mature and self-assertive, or allows her hips to expand, she is condemned as ugly. Thus, the walls of the European harem separate youthful beauty from ugly maturity”. The objective of both these harems is still the same- to make women feel unwelcome, inadequate and ugly. The Western man thus decides what is “beauty in a woman and controls the whole fashion industry”. Mernissi points out that this is one part of the world where women’s fashion has become the men’s business. "A cultural fixation on female thinness is not an obsession about female beauty," explains Wolf. It is "an obsession about female obedience. Dieting is the most potent political sedative in women's history; a quietly mad population is a tractable one." This is in line with what Bourdeu says about beauty (cited by Mernissi, Scheherzade Goes West) that when women are constantly reminded of physical appearances it hurts them emotionally and relegates them to the status of physical objects. Mernissi states that “being frozen into the passive position of an object whose very existence depends on the eyes of its beholder turns the educated modern Western women into a harem slave”. Alienation According to Leawitt (http://www.mtholyoke.edu/courses/mjiyad/forum/messages/39.shtml, Alienation in the lives of Arab Women: an Experimental Approach to Ancient Questions) alienation refers to the estrangement from prior conditions where the individual was included. It could be culture, family, or even the individual him/herself. When an individual experiences such estrangement, he/she is unable to understand those circumstances or access them due to physical, mental, or social barriers. In the way the Scheherzade has been reconstructed by the West, far removed from what she actually stood for, one notices alienation of Scheherzade from what formed her true identity- her intellect and not just her physical beauty. In trying to emulate Scheherzade’s physical beauty and being so enamoured by it, the Western women are getting alienated from their own consciousness by absorbing influences on how women should look, from the images bombarded at them by media and artists. There is thus alienation in the way West has reconstructed Scheherzade.. Leawitt (http://www.mtholyoke.edu/courses/mjiyad/forum/messages/39.shtml, Alienation in the lives of Arab Women: an Experimental Approach to Ancient Questions) describes the alienation from self. This Leawitt explains as an experience that ignores “personal desire or want or perversion of the individuals needs—be they physical as in necessity to eat (in its extreme form this is known as anorexia nervosa), or mental, such as the necessity to interact with other people on a regular basis. Refusal or renouncement of the capabilities and natural desires alienates the mind or the person from their body and/or their personality”. In Fatima Mernissi’s novel Dreams of Trespass: Tales of Harem Girlhood, a situation of self-alienation occurs when the main character Fatima becomes so intrigued by the stories of Scheherazade and the tales of A Thousand and One Nights that she loses some touch with her actual situation. It is seen as a form of escapism which allowed them to forget about their current situation and the reality that faces her. Leawitt (http://www.mtholyoke.edu/courses/mjiyad/forum/messages/39.shtml, Alienation in the lives of Arab Women: an Experimental Approach to Ancient Questions) points out that “the desire to escape is usually linked with fear or distaste for the current situation under which the individual lives and by escaping the situation through fanticization or daydreaming or obsession over folk tales, the girl is losing touch with the part of herself that is forced to live in the harem situation and deal with all that that encompasses”. One can argue that when western women buy into the beauty myth they ignore their personal desire and even need to eat to fit into the popular concept of staying slim to look youthful and beautiful. They thus experience self alienation. If Scheherzade is an ideal for them in terms of beauty, they are alienated from the true beauty of Scheherzade which was essentially a mental capacity. Exploring this concept further, Leawitt points out that alienation as an aspect in the lives of women in the Arab world is paramount in understanding their current situation and circumstances. It is used as a means of oppression by the men, a way to keep the women in their culturally and historically assigned gender roles; it is used by the women as a way to rebel against the status quo and as a means of empowerment. This can be likened to how scheherzade who was in reality living under the threat of death and was so fearful, made an outward appearance of calm. It was by alienating herself from her fears that she truly became empowered and was able to win her life even though in reality she was locked by the Sultan. Culture According to Echchaibi (Who speaks for the Arab World? http://www.wacc.org.uk/wacc/publications/media_development/2007_2/who_speaks_for_the_arab_world) “Orientalism’s most enduring damage is its unrelenting assumption that the ‘West’ and the ‘Orient’ exist only as cultural counterpoints with distinct systems of morality, traditions, values, religion, and science. Said’s detractors have often attacked the project of orientalism on the basis that the ‘West’ is often presented as the monolithic Orient that Said criticized”. This leads to confrontation between the two cultures. Literary Influence of Scheherzade The appearance of Scheherzade in the West first occurred in the 19th century, when it was translated into French and then English and then other European languages. It was at this time that the name The Arabian Nights’ Entertainment or simply Arabian Nights was coined (Wikipedia, 2008, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabian_Nights). According to Wikipedia (2008) the best known stories from The Nights include "Aladdin's Wonderful Lamp," "Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves," and "The Seven Voyages of Sinbad the Sailor." However these stories, even though they are genuine Middle Eastern folk tales, were not originally part of the "Nights" in its Arabic versions. Antoine Galland’s first European version was trnsalted in French from Arabic text and other sources. This was a 12-volume book, Les Mille et une nuits, contes arabes traduits en français ("Thousand and one nights, Arab stories translated into French"), which contained stories that were not even there in the original Arabic manuscript. He wrote that he heard them from a Syrian Christian storyteller from Aleppo, a Maronite scholar whom he called "Hanna Diab" (Wikipedia, 2008). Galand’s version of the Nights gained immense popularity throughout Europe and version of Gallan’s stories were written by his publisher even without his name or consent. The best known English translation is by Sir Richard Francis Burton, called The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night (1885) (Wikipedia, 2008). Unlike previous editions his ten-volume translation had no censorship. Even though it was printed in the Victorian era it contained several erotic nuances of the source material and was replete with sexual imagery and pederastic allusions added as appendices to the main stories by Burton. Burton circumvented strict Victorian laws on obscene material by printing a private edition for subscribers only rather than publicly publishing the book. His original ten volumes were followed by a further six entitled The Supplemental Nights to the Thousand Nights and a Night, which were printed between 1886 and 1888 (Wikipedia, 2008). The Scheherzade has been a popular literary figure and has been depicted as a symbolic tool in stories, movies, theatre and art. One of the first Hollywood movies in 1942 based on the The Nights was called “Arabian Nights”. The story had no resemblance to the traditional version of the book. In the film, Scheherazade is shown as a dancer who attempts to overthrow Caliph Harun al-Rashid and marry his brother. After Scheherazade’s initial coup attempt fails and she is sold into slavery, many adventures then ensue (Wikipedia, 2008). Over centuries now, Scheherzade’s character has drawn a lot of attention. For instance as pointed by Crosette (1999) (http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E05E0DE173BF935A35751C0A96F958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all) Arab novelists who wrote from 1899 to 1990 were drawn to Scheherzade. Mernissi (cited by Crosette (1999) (http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E05E0DE173BF935A35751C0A96F958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all) has also stated in an interview that “In the 1920's as a number of Muslim countries began to modernize and secularize, big names in the Arab world spoke of Scheherazade as an example for intellectuals fighting for their rights. She was a fighter for the right of free expression”. References 1. http://www.imageandnarrative.be/autofiction/abdo.htm 2. Said, E (1979) Orientalism. Vintage books: US 3. Thornton, Lynne. Women as Portrayed in Orientalist Painting. Paris: ACR PocheCouleur, 1994. 4. Weber, C. (2001) http://www.accessmylibrary.com/coms2/summary_0286-10432537_ITM, Unveiling Scheherazade: Feminist Orientalism In The International Alliance Of Women, 1911-1950. 5. Sered, D. (1996), Orientalism, http://www.english.emory.edu/Bahri/Orientalism.html 6. Sullivan (2005) Events Exhibits reveal bias of Orientalism, VOL. 25. NO.14 MAY 10, 2005 7. Taxidou,O. (1998), Routledge, Mask: A Periodical Performance by Edward Gordon. 8. Sallis, Eva. Scheherezade through the Looking Glass: The Metamorphosis of the Thousand and One Nights. Richmond: Curzon Press, 1999 9. Abdo, D.M. (2007) Narrating Little Fatima: A Picture is Worth 1001 Tales — “Multiple Critique” in Fatima Mernissi’s Dreams of Trespass: Tales of a Harem Girlhood , http://www.imageandnarrative.be/autofiction/abdo.htm 10. Huff-Rouselle, M. 2003, http://www.mernissi.net/civil_society/portraits/fatimamernissi.html, A Contemporary Scheherazade's Tales of a Borderless World 11. Hariharan, G. (2005) http://www.telegraphindia.com/1050821/asp/opinion/story_5097657.asp, Scheherzade’s Story, The Telegraph 12. Mernissi, F. (1985) Beyond the Veil Male-Female Dynamics in Modern Muslim Society.Saki Books Publisher, London, 1985. 13. Merniss, F. (2001) Scheherzade Goes West, Washington Square press: US 14. Merniss, F. (1994) Dream of Trespass Tales of a harem Girlhood. Perseus Books: US 15. Buss, D. Evolution of Desire, http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0465021433/002-6279604-3254455?v=glance&n=283155 16. Leawitt, W. Alienation in the lives of Arab Women: an Experimental Approach to Ancient Questions http://www.mtholyoke.edu/courses/mjiyad/forum/messages/39.shtml, 17. Naomi Wolf (2002) Beauty Myth. New York: Morrow 18. Echchaibi, N. (2007) (Who speaks for the Arab World? http://www.wacc.org.uk/wacc/publications/media_development/2007_2/who_speaks_for_the_arab_world) 19. http://www.chowk.com/articles/10142, Unveiling the Myth of the Muslim Woman, 20. Gill, L. (2001) http://www.memphisflyer.com/memphis/Content?oid=oid%3A1138, Harem Scarum, More tales from the mind of Scheherazade and the minds of men 21. Crosette, B. (1999) Muslim Women hear the call of the story teller. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E05E0DE173BF935A35751C0A96F958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all Read More