American Women Readers Encounter Turkey in the Shadow of Popular Romance

Kathlene POSTMA

Article Details

American Women Readers Encounter Turkey in the Shadow of Popular Romance

Authors:

Kathlene POSTMA

Publisher:

American Studies Association of Turkey (ASAT)

Journal:

Journal of American Studies of Turkey 1999 Issue 9, pp.71-82

Document Type:

Article

Publication Date:

3/1999

Document Language:

English

Document ID (Org No.):

2000735243

Frequency:

Bi-Annual

pISSN:

1300-6606

Abstract:

 

Demetra Vaka's In the Shadow of Islam, published by Houghton Mifflin in   1911, depicts Millicent Grey, a recent Radcliffe graduate bent on improving the   world through her naïve attempts at international philanthropy. The athletic, blonde   American heiress arrives in İstanbul with little more than the vaguest of good   intentions and soon finds herself in a passionate struggle with a threatening,   desperate, and dark-complexioned Ottoman lover. At first glance, Vaka appears to   have created a popular romance novel, a New Woman variation on F. Marion   Crawford’s love stories, then the rage with women readers, in which heroes and   heroines, separated largely by their race, ethnicity, or social class, pursue and flee   each other across sensational locations. In the Shadow of Islam’s setting seems to   capitalize on the Western hunger for the exotic, specifically the Oriental, that would   inspire silent films such as The Sheik  1921 , the paintings of Gustav Klimt, and the   architecture, decor, and clothing fashion of the 1920s.

Article Details

American Women Readers Encounter Turkey in the Shadow of Popular Romance

Authors: Kathlene POSTMA

Publisher: American Studies Association of Turkey (ASAT)

Journal: Journal of American Studies of Turkey 1999 Issue 9, pp.71-82

Document Type: Article

Publication Date: 3/1999

Document Language: English

Document ID (Org No.): 2000735243

Frequency: Bi-Annual

pISSN: 1300-6606

Issues

Authors:

Kathlene POSTMA

Publisher:

American Studies Association of Turkey (ASAT)

Journal:

Journal of American Studies of Turkey 1999 Issue 9, pp.71-82

Document Type:

Article

Publication Date:

3/1999

Document Language:

English

Document ID (Org No.):

2000735243

Frequency:

Bi-Annual

pISSN:

1300-6606