By including the words "before Orientalism" in the title of this collection of 11 papers exploring visual representations of the Ottoman Muslim in Western art, Harper (Renaissance and Baroque
art, U. of Oregon) intends to signify that the East-West encounter as it existed in the period covered in this volume (1450-1750) was fundamentally different from that of the modern, industrial
era discussed by Edward Said in his influential Orientalism, largely because of a very different balance of power between East and West in the Renaissance and Baroque periods. The essays
problematize the images of Ottoman or Islamic subject matter in Western art of the era and explore the contextual forces that shaped such depictions. Annotation 穢2011 Book News, Inc., Portland,
OR (booknews.com)
