Visualizing Egypt : European travel, book publishing, and the commercialization of the Middle East in the nineteenth century / Paulina Banas.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Banas, Paulina, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Travelers--Egypt--History--19th century.

Travelers.

Travelers' writings, British--History and criticism.

Travelers' writings, British.

Travelers' writings, French--History and criticism.

Travelers' writings, French.

Illustrated books--Great Britain--History--19th century.

Illustrated books.

Illustrated books--France--History--19th century.

Egypt--Description and travel.

Egypt.

Egypt--In art.

Physical Description:

xviii, 369 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (some color) ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Cairo ; New York : The American University in Cairo Press, 2025.

Summary:

"Bonaparte's short-lived 1798 campaign in Egypt, new possibilities of travel, and improvements in printing technology in nineteenth-century France and Britain, a new publishing business dedicated to the production of albums and travel accounts picturing Muslim Egypt and Islamic architecture emerged to cater to a growing European fascination. Visualizing Egypt is about these nineteenth-century French and British illustrated publications filled with images brought from travel to Egypt and then published and promulgated to the Western audience. It analyzes the context and process of production of these books, from their conceptualization to the finished product and its afterlife, from marketing to the sales of these books, and from circulation to their reception by the nineteenth-century audience. By following the long, arduous, and often risky publishing journeys of the makers of these books, from publishers to writers, and artists, such as the Frenchman Émile Prisse d'Avennes, Paulina Banas reveals changing market demands, collaborations, conflicting views, and the unsettled authorship of these works prompting us to think more profoundly about the artistic and intellectual exchange in the world of 19th-century Orientalist book production. By bringing together interests in travel writing, illustration, commerce, the free enterprise of publishing, and technology more broadly, Visualizing Egypt regards nineteenth-century book illustrations on Egypt and the "Orient" not merely as expressions of enduring ideology and colonial propaganda, but as representations shaped by the often-overlooked commercial exigencies of the growing publishing industry and the reckless competition among them."-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Making it "Modern" : The Publisher's Perspective and the Marketing of the Nile Valley

Observing, Recording, and Building the Archive : The Author's Perspective

Creating Cultural Tropes : The Publishers, the Authors, and the Politics of Circulation of Visual Sources

Recasting Stereotypes? Multivocal Reading through the Artist, Writer, and Audience's Perspective

Conflicting Viewpoints and New Visualization Strategies : The Audience, Publisher(s), Author(s), and the Printmakers

The Authors, the Uneven Politics of Citation and Collaboration, and the Reuse of Commercial Photographs

Epilogue: The Venture of Orientalist Publishing.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9781617976674

1617976679

OCLC:

1425101657

Publisher Number:

90101709318