Vathek

Orientalism, a concept made famous by Edward Said’s 1978 book Orientalism, is the critical concept of Western depictions of and interest in Eastern cultures. Usually derogatory or fetishistic in nature, Orientalism consists of a specifically imperialistic idea of the “East”—a descriptor that itself conflates vastly different cultures and peoples from across North Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. In the late 18th through the 19th centuries, much of Europe was fascinated by these regions and cultures, with many artists and writers using a mythical “Eastern” landscape as a setting. These works often emphasized the perceived hedonism and mysticism of the East. Though Orientalism would reach its height toward the end of the 19th century, the Western literary world of the late 18th century was already engaging with common Orientalist themes and plots.

Writers of the Romantic movement often made use of Eastern settings and Orientalist themes, influenced by the increased contact that resulted from colonialism. The Western idea of the East as beautiful, wild, and “exotic” suited the Romantic focus on intense emotions and natural beauty. Common elements of Romantic Orientalism are supernatural events, passionate love affairs, and sublime natural settings, all based around perceived “exoticism.” Lord Byron’s Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage and Turkish Tales and Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s Kubla Khan make use of these Western ideas of Eastern cultures.

Gothic literature, which like Romanticism focuses on the emotional lives of its characters and on supernatural events, similarly utilized Orientalism. Settings that are considered foreign and “exotic” heighten the Gothic interest in and fear of the “other”; The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole takes place in southern Italy, while Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein begins in the vast white expanse of the Arctic. Vathek’s setting—a portion of the Abbasid Caliphate corresponding to modern-day Iraq and Iran—follows this literary trend. Beckford not only employs an “othered” backdrop but also uses supposed Eastern decadence to develop his moral about The Dangers of Excess, scaring contemporary readers and justifying some of the more extreme behaviors of his characters.

Vathek’s depiction of Eastern cultures employs a similarly Western lens, using a Turkish slur for non-Muslims (“Giaour”) to refer to the Indian merchant, depicting the servants of the Greek Carathis as African, and depicting Islam as Christianity by a different name; for example, the jinn of Islamic lore are not the angelic messengers of Vathek but rather corporeal (if often invisible) beings more on par with humans. Though offensive by modern standards, Beckford’s portrayal of different nationalities exposes then prevalent Western concepts of race and the East.