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Re: Reading Lolita in Tehran in a new light
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Hamid Dabashi's analysis of Nafisi's _Reading Lolita
in Tehran_ nicely articulates what many who work in
the Arab or Islamic world felt on reading this
book*which, indeed, they must do amid an auratic
'Western' miasma. The book, as Dabashi points out, is
inseparable from Western/US mystifications; it is what
one might also call a fishy book. For many, it only
smells of comprador politics; for others, it gives off
a more insidious odour of unapologetic US apologetics.
The book, which is otherwise profoundly superficial,
is now seen as a shameful co-optation of not only VN
but also several other canonical English literary
figures in the interests of wide-eyed North American
disinterest.
Best wishes,
Piers Smith (late of, etc. etc.)
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in Tehran_ nicely articulates what many who work in
the Arab or Islamic world felt on reading this
book*which, indeed, they must do amid an auratic
'Western' miasma. The book, as Dabashi points out, is
inseparable from Western/US mystifications; it is what
one might also call a fishy book. For many, it only
smells of comprador politics; for others, it gives off
a more insidious odour of unapologetic US apologetics.
The book, which is otherwise profoundly superficial,
is now seen as a shameful co-optation of not only VN
but also several other canonical English literary
figures in the interests of wide-eyed North American
disinterest.
Best wishes,
Piers Smith (late of, etc. etc.)
Search the archive: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/archives/nabokv-l.html
Contact the Editors: mailto:nabokv-l@utk.edu,nabokv-l@holycross.edu
Visit Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
View Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm