Talk:The Talisman

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I changed one bit of offensively political POV sermonizing for a more accurate one, but would be happy to see both deleted in favor of a simple statement that this was one of the first Western books to take a romantic and positive view of Muslims. Alteripse 15:09, 24 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Sermonizing? I merely stated that there was an anti-Muslim bias which was certainly religiously driven - and because the attitude wasn't interested in anything outside of Europe, it was eurocentric by definition. Furthermore, it was really only Saladin in the novel who was portrayed as virtuous - it's certainly debatable whether Muslims are portrayed as admirable in the book. Also, how is "It is perhaps no coincidence that the novel was written two decades after the West freed itself from over 1000 years of Muslim invasions, slave raiding, and forced conversion" relevant to the article? That sounds more like sermonizing than what I wrote - if there is a connection between some reconquest (which was in Spain anyway and not anywhere near Scott's view), it's best to cite an actual historian to avoid the perception of POV. Frikle 04:06, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I was trying to make you aware that your editorial comment at the end struck me as a peculiar and unnecessary misinterpretation. Let me explain. I took your comment as meaning that you considered Scott ahead of his time in being less "Eurocentric" and Christian in his writing. I think this is belied by the body of his work, which is firmly placed in a Christian perspective. Instead, what he was really pioneering was the new "romantic" novel, where villains and heroes are extreme. It makes a better plot to have a contrasting sympathetic character in the enemy camp, but Scott's characters make Dan Brown's characters seem nuanced and human.

Since your sentence seemed to imply that Scott presaged a new European perspective on Islam, I thought back to what had been going on in Scott's lifetime between Islam and the West. His was the generation that saw the power and threat of Islam permanently broken. How much history do you know? From the time Mohammed led Arab armies against the Byzantine Empire around 700 AD until about 1700, the Islamic world repeatedly invaded and encroached upon the West. Why do you think there are Moslems in the Balkans? It wasn't missionaries or immigration. Not once, but repeatedly over centuries their armies invaded Europe. They invaded and kept all of North Africa and Asia Minor. They invaded and occupied Greece for centuries. They invaded and occupied Spain for centuries. They invaded France and were turned back halfway to Paris! They invaded Eastern Europe repeatedly, most recently in 1683, being turned back at the gates of Vienna.

The crusades were 4 minor and largely unsuccessful blips in an otherwise unbroken millennium of Muslim aggression against Christian countries and peoples. Only one of the 4 crusades resulted in even a few decades of occupation of part of Palestine.

The turning points, the high tide, for Islamic conquest of Europe came at (1) the final expulsion of the Moorish conquerors from Spain in 1492 (you are correct at that one), (2) the battle of Lepanto in 1571 when a European navy broke the navy of the Ottomans, and (3) the Battle of Vienna in 1683. After Lepanto, there was no organized naval threat from Islam in the Mediterranean, just raids and piracy.

For nearly all of that time, Muslim raiders into Russia, all the Mediterranean shores of Europe, and even the Atlantic shores as far as Iceland, took Christian slaves. This was not isolated piracy but was sanctioned by their rulers and their religion and continued up until Scott's lifetime. The Barbary pirates were not Caribbean freebooters and outlaws, they were the ships of the state, the Pashas and Deys, part of the Ottoman Empire. They attacked any undefended ship and either enslaved or held for hostage any Christian passengers or sailors they could capture right up into Scott's lifetime.

The final destruction of the Islamic threat to Europe did not occur until Scott's lifetime, roughly 1800 to 1840. During these years a European land army (France) first invaded and defeated an Ottoman army in Egypt (1799), the American navy (1815) finally broke the threat of enslavement for Western Christian sailors and travellers in the Mediterranean whose countries had not paid tribute. Muslim enslavement of non-European Christians in North Africa south of the Mediterranean coast has continued, though diminishing, to this century. The very year that Scott published The Talisman, the British were assisting Greece in expelling the Muslim occupation. If you want me to cite a historian, the best account of the early 19th century triumph of the West over the Muslim empires is Paul Johnson's 'Birth of the Modern.' I don't think even a Muslim historian could accurately dispute the facts I am outlining here.

So my point was that up until Scott's lifetime, Islam had represented a real threat to Europe. Perhaps when that threat was broken, it was easier to speak with generosity about Saladin. I actually think that Scott's portrayal of Saladin is interpreted best as Romantic literature, rather than a break with a "Eurocentric" perspective or a new "West triumphant" perspective.

Please don't take personal offense at my correcting you. So here is the acknowledged POV: I tend to react strongly when I hear people saying things to suggest Islam has been more the subject of Western aggresson than otherwise. While true in the last 200 years, the West has a long way to go to match them in bloody aggression, invasion, and religious intolerance.

I assume you are young and haven't had much history taught you. I hope this is interesting to you. I share your appreciation of Scott and I changed the ending of the article avoid both political points. Alteripse 14:49, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Thanks for supplying me with the background info. Although I knew about the long history of Muslim invasions, I wasn't aware of their extent. However, I believe that both sides have committed acts that they might be ashamed for - but which side has more of the blame is a complicated issue. You seem to believe that Muslims have been the major agressors especially in the time leading up to Scott (and there is evidence to support this) while I still consider it an unanswered question for me. When I mentioned the anti-Muslim sentiments before Scott, I didn't say they were totally unjustified. All I meant was that Christian Europe, on top of reacting to invasions, felt (of course this is a generalisation) morally superior to any foreign culture or religion.

So, I just wanted to express the interesting fact about the Talisman, that before it, there were almost no positive portrayals of Muslims. Whether that was the result of history is a more fuzzy question, which is why I suggested quoting a historian (and as far as I know, there are none that connect Scott specifically to the end of the Muslim conquest). I know Scott's positive portrayal of Saladin the trend didn't start a whole new approach (the Talisman is one of Scott's more obscure works I think). The final version of the sentence in the article is much better, as it avoids the connotations of the terms used in the previous 2 versions.

Frikle 07:20, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)