Monday, October 15, 2012

Mary Shelly's Views of Orientalism in Frankenstein(the novel)

Throughout the novel, Shelly mildly highlights the views of orientalism. Her views are most prevalent in chapters 13 and 14. In these chapters, she introduces new characters, Safie, and Safie's father, the Turk. Safie is characterized as a middle eastern woman who comes to Germany to visit Felix. Her character traits suggest that she is somewhat mystical, throughout the chapter Shelly emphasizes Safie's beauty and flawlessness that are parallel with the views of orientalism.
Safie is the Jasmine of the book. Her unique and unrealistic qualities are the same that the famous Disney princess has. Essentially, Safie is a princess. Even more so when, we learn that Felix will drop everything to be with her even though she is a stranger. She also possesses her princess like quality when she leaves the middle east because she fed up,just as Jasmine did in the movie Aladdin. The way Shelly characterized Safie alone, contributes to Mary Shelly orientalist views. U.S. Westerners that practice orientalism characterize women of the middle east as women who are glorified because of their beauty, but are to oppressed to become anything other than a beautiful woman. The however part of their view directly correlates to Shelly's stronghold of Safie from her father, the Turk.

No comments:

Post a Comment