The Sheik

Yesterday, on my recent foray to the library, I managed to get my hands on a copy of E.M. Hull's "The Sheik". For those not romantically inclined, it was first published in 1919, and details the love story of one Diana Mayo and Ahmed ben Hassan, the ...errr.... sheik. It is the first modern romance - romance as we know it now. Following that, I read two Mills and Boons romances in the same vein. What I find disturbing was not so much the racism in Hull's book - one has to excuse the era for what it was- but the same that I find in more recent novels, the latest published in 2002. Even in our era, the 'exotic Oriental' exist. I read a book some time back detailing the "exoticizing of the Oriental"; a process stretching from the Crusades. It makes a very salient point - that that is a form of making the "Other" different, distinct; and in extreme cases, less human. Right....I get it when it was the colonial era, but now, it seems that such dichotomies should (theoretically) be gone. Hrrr....idealistic me. So, we have the tyrannical Arab rulers, who bends their women to their will, and of course, it takes the heroine (who, in both Mills and Boons, have American, i.e. white, parentage) to teach them the ideals of communication between partners, equality and freedom of speech. Groan. Sounds like anyone we know, y'all?
I am all for equality (jury's still out on freedom of speech - can there be complete freedom? ) but I resent it being stuffed down our throats like that. Anyway, can't speak for all Mills and Boons - or the whole publishing world - but I found both books galling. Still, it would be an interesting research topic - Colonies in the postcolonial world. :D