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A University of Sussex DPhil thesis Available online via Sussex Research Online: http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/ This thesis is protected by copyright which belongs to the author. This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the Author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the Author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Please visit Sussex Research Online for more information and further details i ORIENTALISM BETWEEN TEXT AND EXPERIENCE: RICHARD BURTON, T. E. LAWRENCE AND THE CHANGING DISCOURSE OF SEXUAL MORALITY IN THE ARAB EAST FERAS ALKABANI DPHIL UNIVERSITY OF SUSSEX MAY 2013 ii STATEMENT I hereby declare that this thesis has not been and will not be, submitted in whole or in part to another University for the award of any other degree. Signature ………………………………………………….. i UNIVERSITY OF SUSSEX FERAS ALKABANI DPHIL ORIENTALISM BETWEEN TEXT AND EXPERIENCE: RICHARD BURTON, T. E. LAWRENCE AND THE CHANGING DISCOURSE OF SEXUAL MORALITY IN THE ARAB EAST SUMMARY This thesis examines certain narratives in Richard Burton’s and T. E. Lawrence’s encounters with the Arab East. By juxtaposing both Orientalists’ accounts of Arab sexuality with the changes that had been taking place in Arabic literary and cultural discourse of the time, I highlight what appears to be a disparity in representation. Nonetheless, I argue that this disparity stems from a perception of ‘difference’ that characterises the relationship between East and West. This perception of ‘difference’ is further explored in the writings of Arab scholars on European culture since the beginning of the Euro-Arab encounter in the nineteenth century. I expose the epistemological bases of this modern encounter and situate it within the political changes that had been shaping the emerging Middle East on the eve of modernity. Burton and Lawrence are also situated within this context. I show how their Orientalist discourse involved a process of conflating ‘text’ and ‘experience’ while interacting with the Arab East. This conflation is evident in their textual rendition of certain experiential episodes they underwent in the Orient. While both Orientalists’ attraction to the Arab East may have been epistemological in origin, I argue that their narratives on Arab homoeroticism have been discursively subjective. In this, they appear to reflect the selectivity with which fin-de-siècle Arab scholars had been reproducing accounts of their past cultural heritage; albeit paradoxically. When Burton and Lawrence seem to have been heightening manifestations of Arab male-to-male sexuality, their contemporary Arab intellectuals had been engaged in a process of systematic attenuation of the traces of past depictions of homoerotic desire in Arabic literature. ii Although I focus on analysing texts from both Orientalists, I also draw on contemporary historical events, for they form part of the contextual framework in which my analysis operates. iii CONTENTS Acknowledgements iv Chapter One: Epistemologies of Difference: An Introduction 1 Chapter Two: Arabian Pleasures from Text to Experience 30 Chapter Three: Chivalric Fantasies and Homoerotic Romance in the Desert 82 Chapter Four: The Homoerotic and the Heroic: Two Perspectives 133 Conclusion 178 Bibliography 180 iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis would not have been completed had it not been for the great help and friendly support of my supervisor, Dr Vincent Quinn. Vincent has been exceptionally generous with his time and availability. He has patiently supervised the project and provided indispensible advice, feedback and guidance that formed and informed the emergence of this thesis. I would like to express my deepest gratitude for him. Thank you very much for everything, Vincent. Thanks must also go to my partner, Stephen Cook, who has supported me in more ways than I can mention here. Above all, Stephen has been my family in the UK. He has given me his undivided attention and created an ideal environment for me to work. Being with Stephen has also helped me appreciate the UK and its culture better. I have learnt a lot from him – not to mention his insightful feedback on the thesis. For these reasons and so many others, thank you, Stephen. Having lived in Brighton for 7 years, I am now proud to call it home. This would have been difficult had it not been for the wonderful friends I have made here while studying at Sussex. So I must extend my thanks to Gráinne O’Connell, who read the earlier versions of some of my chapters and provided me with thorough and detailed feedback. Thanks to Shamira Meghani, Kirsty Bennett, Jeongsuk Kim, Nadia Yazidi, Louis Katsouris, Collin Jerome, Richard Curtin, Heba Youssef, Carolyn Lambert, Patricia Couturas, Gilly and David Hanna-Dutfield, Hannah Wen- Shan Shieh, Khalid al-Hariri, Saveria Lincoln, Ronan McKinney, Ann Hamblen, Nozomi Uematsu, John Mifsud, Belinda Hackney, Amira Mills, Misa Madgwick and Marie Partridge who have all shown their love, support and friendship in various ways. From the School of English at Sussex, I must thank Laura Vellacott, Professor Vicky Lebeau, Dr Céline Surprenant, Professor Lindsay Smith, Professor Jenny Bourne-Taylor and my initial supervisor, Professor William J Spurlin. Special thanks to Dr Denise DeCaires Narain and Professor Marcus Wood, whose feedback in the Annual Review has been very helpful. I must also extend my thanks and gratitude to my viva voce examiners, Professor Marcus Wood and Professor Gregory Woods. Both professors’ insights into the thesis and their invaluable advice on how it can develop into a monograph have been most useful. Above all, I would like to thank you both for a great viva experience. I now understand what people mean when they say, “enjoy your viva!” I would like to specify one particular dear friend of mine, Randal Kinkead, whom I met in Damascus 9 years ago. Randal always inspired me; our friendship was very special. Sadly, v Randal passed away shortly after I passed my viva voce examination in January 2014. He was the first person I rang when I passed my viva; I will never forget how happy and proud he was. It is to Randal’s memory that I dedicate this work. Finally, I would like to remember my family in Damascus: Lina, Abdulghani, Waseem and Nisreen, and thank them for their continuous love. I had not been able to see them while working on this project due to the troubles that erupted in Syria in 2011. However, we have recently been able to reunite briefly in Beirut after 3 years’ separation. In my research, I have had to look at specific episodes that took place in the region’s recent history – in the past hundred years or so. This has given me an insight into the background of modern Syria. It has also rekindled my faith in the country’s resilience and its ability to rise from turmoil, as it has done many times before. Feras Alkabani August 2014 1 Chapter One: Epistemologies of Difference: An Introduction 2 The ‘(Un)changing East’: Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet, Till Earth and Sky stand presently at God’s great Judgement Seat; But there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth, When two strong men stand face to face, though they come from the end of the earth! (Kipling 1889, Cited in Kipling 1912, p.234) The Orient [...] existed as a set of values attached, not to its modern realities, but to a series of valorised contacts it had had with a distant European past. (Said 2003, p.85) The concept of the ‘Unchanging East’ underpins much of Orientalist discourse.1 A sense of alterity and otherness is implied in this notion. Yet the origins, purposes and background of this perception are complex and multi-layered. From fascination with the East to contempt and disapproval of its ‘degenerate ways’, European Orientalism’s employment of alterity varies with the various Orientalists who have been to and/or written about the Arab East. Essential to this image of difference is a remarkable emphasis on sexuality. Derek Hopwood (1999) offers an insight into the background of Orientalist prejudice against the Muslim-Arab Orient’s sexual morality. He traces these prejudiced Orientalist perceptions about Islam’s (and the Arabs’) sexual morality and points out how they originate in early narratives touching upon the Prophet’s marital life and the number of wives he had;2 this has led to all Muslims being accused of the ‘lustfulness’ with which their Prophet had been characterised (1999, p.6). Of course, this rhetoric of sexual/moral othering is to be seen in light of the wider Christian- Muslim rivalry in what eventually became two over-arching, theologically-determined mega- cultures: Christendom in Europe and a Muslim Caliphate in the (mainly Arabic-Speaking) Middle East.3 The essentialism and otherness imbedded in the Prophet’s alleged ‘lustfulness’ and its ‘transcendence’ to his followers are crucial to the way in which Oriental Arab sexuality has been perceived and portrayed in Orientalist discourse.4 This image of essentialist and irredeemable ‘difference’ is, of course, relevant to the concept of the ‘Unchanging East’, which, quite paradoxically, also suggests an ‘unchanging West’ with which this ‘static’ Arab East forms a constant binary opposition. Unless, however, the oppositional logic to the 1 The concept of the ‘Unchanging East’ and its application in Orientalist discourse will be further highlighted in my forthcoming chapters, particularly in Chapters Three and Four in relation to T. E. Lawrence. 2 See Hopwood (1999, pp.6-9) for an account of the Prophet’s wives and an overview of the depiction of his martial life in Orientalist literature.