Self-Orientalization and Modern Barbarization (“Kill the Bulgarian”)

Abstract

One of the most influential satires in which Orientals served as Western mimics is Montesquieu’s Lettres persanes (1721). It much defines the genre and synthesises patterns of making of the other. Strange that Said never used this rich source for his Orientalisms. A brief overview of the plot may be useful to illustrate self-orientalizing. It evolves around Usbek who is worried for his harem as he gets older, moreover he had to leave this responsibility to his eunuchs, and Rica – a young Persian gentleman who has just arrived in Paris to confront with exotic civilization of 18 c?