Byron’s View of the Otoman Empire: The Case of Don Juan

Jankova, Natka (2014) Byron’s View of the Otoman Empire: The Case of Don Juan. Зборник ПЈЈП, Скопје 2014, 21-25. ISSN 821.111.09

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Abstract

This paper covers Byron’s view of the Otoman Empire through his famous poem Don Juan. Byron
is deemed as central to the Romantc vision. His visit to Turkey and the Turkish seraglio made him
a bridge-builder between the East and the West where we can easily recognize the patriarchal
despotsm and the sexual and cultural wealth. Byron’s memories of his Eastern experiences had
almost faded by the tme he wrote Don Juan, so it can be summed up that the material in it is not
the result of frst hand experiences, but Byron’s deep readings and observatons of the Otoman
Empire’s history and manners. This is where Byron’s attude towards the East in Don Juan comes
from seen as calculated, slight, and satrical. Having established the directon of Byron’s approach
which is concentrated in the ffh and sixth cantos and referred to in the seventh and eighth, it can be
said that Byron’s involvement with the East in Don Juan is mainly focused on the seraglio, the symbol
of Eastern Power and fraud and the most powerful aspect of the Muslim East. In the fnal chapter of
this paper I further explain the Byronic hero introduced by Byron and Don Juan as a typical Byronic
hero who seeks adventure and is seen as mixture of good and evil.

Item Type: Article
Subjects: Humanities > Languages and literature
Divisions: Faculty of Philology
Depositing User: Natka Alagozovska
Date Deposited: 22 Nov 2019 10:59
Last Modified: 22 Nov 2019 10:59
URI: https://eprints.ugd.edu.mk/id/eprint/22918

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