Mada'in Saleh
F
or those of us inclined toward the Oriental, the very
name Arabia is synonymous with "away", a privileged
place to remove to, an epitome of Otherness. But as
my late professor, Edward Said wrote in Orientalism, his
study of Western representations of the Middle East, such
depictions are flawed by condescension, by an assessment
of these civilizations as static and undeveloped, however
beautiful European artists and writers found them to be,
and however beautifully they rendered them in works such
as Flaubert's novel, Salammbo, or in Ingres' paintings of
the harem.
HYLAND
