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Exorcising Exoticism: Carmen and the Construction of Oriental Spain

Exorcising Exoticism: Carmen and the Construction of Oriental Spain NE WOULD THINK that everything has already been said about Carmen— the character, the novel, the opera, and her infinite resurrections in the last one hundred years of plenitude—and that we might as well let her rest in peace. However, the persistence in the popular imagination of the notion of Carmen as the ultimate essence of Spanishness is troubling. A recent poll in the European Union revealed that, after Don Quixote and Don Juan, Carmen was the fictional character most identified with Spain. Even more puzzlingly, twenty percent of those surveyed believed Spain to be an “oriental nation” (Pulido 10). Both perceptions have been deeply intertwined in the imaginary construction of the Gypsy as icon of Spanishness. This confusion of cultural identities requires the resuscitation of Carmen in critical discourse, if only to exorcise the demons of exoticism for now.1 Several underlying myths deeply imbedded in the European imagination converge on the construction of Carmen: the orientalization of Spain, or cultural conflation of Spain with the Orient, in the nineteenth century; the romantic mythification of the bohemian as gypsy, or imaginary conflation of Bohéme (the region where many Gypsies lived) and Bohème (the “gypsy way of life”); and http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Comparative Literature Duke University Press

Exorcising Exoticism: Carmen and the Construction of Oriental Spain

COLMEIRO, JOSE F.
Comparative Literature , Volume 54 (2) – Jan 1, 2002
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Publisher
Duke University Press
Copyright
Copyright 2002 by University of Oregon
ISSN
0010-4124
eISSN
1945-8517
DOI
10.1215/-54-2-127
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

NE WOULD THINK that everything has already been said about Carmen— the character, the novel, the opera, and her infinite resurrections in the last one hundred years of plenitude—and that we might as well let her rest in peace. However, the persistence in the popular imagination of the notion of Carmen as the ultimate essence of Spanishness is troubling. A recent poll in the European Union revealed that, after Don Quixote and Don Juan, Carmen was the fictional character most identified with Spain. Even more puzzlingly, twenty percent of those surveyed believed Spain to be an “oriental nation” (Pulido 10). Both perceptions have been deeply intertwined in the imaginary construction of the Gypsy as icon of Spanishness. This confusion of cultural identities requires the resuscitation of Carmen in critical discourse, if only to exorcise the demons of exoticism for now.1 Several underlying myths deeply imbedded in the European imagination converge on the construction of Carmen: the orientalization of Spain, or cultural conflation of Spain with the Orient, in the nineteenth century; the romantic mythification of the bohemian as gypsy, or imaginary conflation of Bohéme (the region where many Gypsies lived) and Bohème (the “gypsy way of life”); and

Journal

Comparative Literature – Duke University Press

Published: Jan 1, 2002

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