CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture ISSN 1481-4374 Purdue University Press ©Purdue University Volume 1 (1999) Issue 2 Article 3 Reading Orientalism and the Crisis of Epistemology in the Novels of Lawrence Durrell James Gifford University of Alberta Follow this and additional works at: https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/clcweb Part of the Comparative Literature Commons, and the Critical and Cultural Studies Commons Dedicated to the dissemination of scholarly and professional information, Purdue University Press selects, develops, and distributes quality resources in several key subject areas for which its parent university is famous, including business, technology, health, veterinary medicine, and other selected disciplines in the humanities and sciences. CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture, the peer-reviewed, full-text, and open-access learned journal in the humanities and social sciences, publishes new scholarship following tenets of the discipline of comparative literature and the field of cultural studies designated as "comparative cultural studies." Publications in the journal are indexed in the Annual Bibliography of English Language and Literature (Chadwyck-Healey), the Arts and Humanities Citation Index (Thomson Reuters ISI), the Humanities Index (Wilson), Humanities International Complete (EBSCO), the International Bibliography of the Modern Language Association of America, and Scopus (Elsevier). The journal is affiliated with the Purdue University Press monograph series of Books in Comparative Cultural Studies. Contact: <[email protected]> Recommended Citation Gifford, James. "Reading Orientalism and the Crisis of Epistemology in the Novels of Lawrence Durrell." 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UNIVERSITY PRESS <http://www.thepress.purdue.edu > CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture ISSN 1481-4374 < http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/clcweb > Purdue University Press ©Purdue University CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture , the peer-reviewed, full-text, and open-access learned journal in the humanities and social sciences, publishes new scholarship following tenets of the discipline of comparative literature and the field of cultural studies designated as "comparative cultural studies." In addition to the publication of articles, the journal publishes review articles of scholarly books and publishes research material in its Library Series. Publications in the journal are indexed in the Annual Bibliography of English Language and Literature (Chadwyck-Healey), the Arts and Humanities Citation Index (Thomson Reuters ISI), the Humanities Index (Wilson), Humanities International Complete (EBSCO), the International Bibliography of the Modern Langua- ge Association of America, and Scopus (Elsevier). The journal is affiliated with the Purdue University Press monog- raph series of Books in Comparative Cultural Studies. Contact: < [email protected] > Volume 1 Issue 2 (June 1999) Article 3 James Gifford, "Reading Orientalism and the Crisis of Epistemology in the Novels of Lawrence Durrell" <http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/clcweb/vol1/iss2/3> Contents of CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture 1.2 (1999) <http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/clcweb/vol1/iss2/ > Abstract: In his article, "Reading Orientalism and the Crisis of Epistemology in the Novels of Lawrence Durrell," James Gifford argues that Edward Said's Orientalism has had a far reaching impact on the study of literature as well as in Comparative Literature, especially in works which depict the "Eastern Other." However, a question arises in those texts which have completed the philosophical motion from existentialism to epistemological skepticism such as the novels of Lawrence Durrell. For example, in The Avignon Quintet a provisional and even counterfactual form of knowledge becomes central and obvious to the reader. Subsequently, knowledge of the Other becomes deflated, and a poor means of defining. The Other -- all that is not the Self -- becomes universalized as the text reveals that (mis)perceptions of the Other are more of a reflection of the Self than they are a truthful depiction of any absolute reality. Acknowledgment of the artifice of art leads to a surrendering of the artist's power to communicate any body of knowledge. In Monsieur , Durrell's forceful realization of the fiction of his work, and constant dissolution of any knowledge it may be communicating is a potential confounding of the knowledge/power relationship in the East/West or Other/Self dialectic. As these theoretical elements serve an important role in Comparative Literature, a further redefining of them in general would be of value to their use in more specific circumstances. James Gifford, "Reading Orientalism and the Crisis of Epistemology in the Novels of Lawrence Durrell" page 2 of 8 CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture 1.2 (1999): < http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/clcweb/vol1/iss2/3 > James GIFFORD Reading Orientalism and the Crisis of Epistemology in the Novels of Lawrence Durrell Contemporary Comparative Literature, when seen as the study of varying world literatures, has been influenced by Said and Foucault's discourse on the relationship between power and knowledge. Moreover, "Othering," as a psychological activity expressed in the knowledge/power relationship, appears to be universal in its literary scope and origins, insofar as knowledge is based on observation of contrast and is expressed through a syntax demanding exclusivity, which intrinsically constructs an Other through which to define difference. This syntactic construct of exclusive binaries (in/out, Self/Other, East/West), has inevitably led to the present situation where the theoretical and philosophic descriptions of the act of Othering, such as Said's Orientalism and Foucault's Madness and Civilization , are quickly coming to a point of contention with literary works which, while admittedly "observing" contrast, seek to make obvious the epistemological ramifications of an awareness of Othering, and the skepticism of truth in knowledge which is therin purported. This article is intended to serve as an investigation of the limitations which are placed on one's analytic approach to a work when such a work's epistemological skepticism becomes a fundamental part of the text itself. Moreover, this redefinition of our tools of analysis -- while applied to one author in this case -- is of equal application to many areas of world literature where questions of epistemology -- of either religious or philosophic origin -- are currently gaining favour. Edward Said's Orientalism has left an irrefutable mark on the analysis and general consideration of literature which incorporates the mystical and sensual Orient as a setting, reference, or image. However, an interesting contention arises when his polemic is applied to a work such as Lawrence Durrell's Alexandria Quartet or Avignon Quintet , where an epistemological crisis forces characters into an entirely personal and provisional world. In such a world, the Oriental Other is no more of a construct than reality in general, with memory and sensory perception falling into troublesome ground. Sensory reality, in effect, becomes as much a discourse as is Orientalism, as both become an internal monologue in a world where multiplicitous reality is exalted and alienation is a fact of life. In this setting, representations of the Orient obviously reflect the observer alone, rather than any absolute external reality, and thereby lose their power to define. It should be made clear at the outset that this essay is an elaboration of Said's demarcation of Orientalism and its far-reaching effects. My purpose is a questioning of the level to which such an analysis is possible in works where exterior reality is brought into doubt, and is not a negative reaction against the application of the term Orientalist. In epistemologically skeptical works such as Durrell's, the superficiality which may suggest an Orientalist framework will be burrowed through by a universalization of the Other by a process of recognizing the Self's tendency to create the Other. Through such a process, it can only be the superficial application or the partial understanding of such a text which is properly termed Orientalist. In the realm where the human mind's tendency to create binary oppositions meets with our eventual recognition of the necessarily constructed nature of all knowledge of the sensual world, a problem arises, whereby one becomes unsure of one's previously held binary opposites and of the possibility of a realistic distinction between Self and Other. Essentially, once a person comes to believe that his/her internal knowledge of the world is suspect,