Introduction

Summary

What is the relationship between Orientalism and literature, and how does it aid us in our reading? Orientalism and Literature sets out to interrogate a key critical concept in literary studies and has the aim of reviewing the evolution of the concept as it has been explored, imagined and narrated in literature. Building upon existing scholarship, the aim is to give readers a comprehensive grasp of the origins and present contours of Orientalism and to point out future directions in this field. In the early eighteenth century the term designated scholarship on the East, as well as a style in the arts. Interest in the study of Oriental languages led to the establishment of Orientalism as a profession. Although it continued as a discipline for well over two centuries, its scope developed beyond its philological beginnings and its vaguely defined existence as a literary or artistic topic or style.