El Viaje a Oriente En La Literatura Femenina Española: Carmen de Burgos, Aurora Bertrana Y Rosa Regàs

Abstract

The article studies the diverse approach to Islamic society of three Spanish women writers who visited this area of the world during different periods of our recent history. Through the literary analysis of their works, the article establishes the extent and limitations of Edward Said's concept of Orientalism in 20 th century Spanish literature and the ambiguities and contradictions of Spain's relationship with the Islamic world.En la primera pa´gina de la edicio´n espan˜ola de Orientalismo, Edward Said (1935-2003 admite que, cuando escribı´a su libro entre 1975 y 1976, ignoraba la relacio´n existente entre Espan˜a y el Islam, y afirma que, en realidad, ''Espan˜a es una notable excepcio´n en el contexto del modelo general europeo cuyas lı´neas generales se describen en Orientalismo'' (9). Segu´n Said, si bien no es posible minimizar ni pasar por alto la complicada relacio´n entre la ideologı´a de la Espan˜a cato´lica y el pasado judeomusulma´n, por tanto tiempo silenciado, lo cierto es que no hay una confrontacio´n beligerante entre el Islam y la cultura espan˜ola y que, en esta relacio´n, existe una complementariedad e intimidad que raramente se ha dado fuera de la Penı´nsula. El crı´tico palestino concluye su comentario indicando que, tanto para los espan˜oles como para los musulmanes, Andalucı´a es un sı´mbolo y sen˜ala que la simbiosis entre Espan˜a y el Islam es un ejemplo de co´mo las culturas se solapan, confluyen y nutren. Algo que debe tenerse especialmente en cuenta ahora que, despue´s del 11 de septiembre, el mundo universitario norteamericano tiende a simplificar la realidad de acuerdo con los planes de dominacio´n de Estados Unidos (10).

Self-fashioning and othering: Women’s double strategies of travel writing

“…Bertrana expresses her anti-colonial aspirations in Paraísos oceánicos emphasising the equal relationships between Polynesian men and women and in doing so she critiques colonial discourses and the gendered structures of Spanish/Western societies. García-Ramón et al (1998) and Torres-Pou (2006) argue that Bertrana' s critique of Spanish colonialism in Morocco is ambivalent because of three reasons: first, because Bertrana condemns Spanish colonialism by virtue of the incompetence of Spanish politicians vis à vis other Europeans -namely the British, the French and the Dutch-but not because she condemns it all together (Torres-Pou 50); second, because her disdain for Spanish colonialism responds to a republican agenda, which, according to García-Ramón et al, served to affirm Catalan nationalism on the premises of its voiced anti-militarism and the Catalan struggle for autonomy (234); and third, because in the mid-thirties «colonialism was no longer perceived as a natural law of civilized countries» (Torres-Pou 43) but was substituted by the imperative of western progress. In the next section we show how the ambivalence of Bertrana' s discourse on colonialism takes shape in Paraísos oceánicos.…”

“…Spanish women' s accounts of travels to Morocco in the 19 th and 20 th centuries (such as those written by Carmen de Burgos, Rosa Regás and Aurora Bertrana) illustrate the particularly ambivalent position of women travellers because they often wrote from the margins of Spanish society but maintained the colonialist/orientalist attitude towards «oriental» peoples (García-Ramón et al 1998;Epps 2016;Goyadol 2008;Torres-Pou 2006). Their texts were embedded within Spanish Africanism, a term used to designate the political interventionism of Spain in Morocco at the beginning of the twentieth century (Morales 1988).…”

Self-fashioning and othering: Women’s double strategies of travel writing

“…Our study nuances this argument by showing how the subject positions established in Bertrana' s and Pos' s texts are conditioned by colonial ideologies and western gender discourses that prevent full identification (if ever possible) and instead emphasise the difference between them and other women (Siegel 2004; Thompson 2007Thompson , 2011Cerarols and García-Ramón 2008). Spanish women' s accounts of travels to Morocco in the 19 th and 20 th centuries (such as those written by Carmen de Burgos, Rosa Regás and Aurora Bertrana) illustrate the particularly ambivalent position of women travellers because they often wrote from the margins of Spanish society but maintained the colonialist/orientalist attitude towards «oriental» peoples (García-Ramón et al 1998;Epps 2016;Goyadol 2008;Torres-Pou 2006). Their texts were embedded within Spanish Africanism, a term used to designate the political interventionism of Spain in Morocco at the beginning of the twentieth century (Morales 1988).…”