Vicente Blasco Ibáñez y Gérard de Nerval : two views of european travellors to Orient

Abstract

The purpose of the current work is to contrast the vision of the Orient of two European travellers, focusing on their capacity to take distance from eurocentrist perspective nourished by the dominant discourses of that time. We have chosen the travel books of Gérard de Nerval y Vicente Blasco Ibáñez, whose texts Voyage en Orient and Oriente are characterised by the intent to take distance, and are situated both of them in a close period of time, an age marked by the industrialization that prejudices and stereotypes about cultural Other, whom they aspire to get to know in his everyday reality. The identitary fluidity which permits it is in the basis of constant renewal of our perspectives, which always makes room for the Other’s voice.