![]() There is an obvious appeal to this semi-realistic Arabic world: customs and practices can be drawn on without discrimination from different countries in the Middle East, and the complicated politics of Middle Eastern countries (and their relationship with the United States) is no longer a factor (Haraway, Vitalis, Deleuze, and Guattari, 43). For example, the sheik often is in a ghutrah, a white headdress, on the first mass-market sheik romance covers of the 1960s, identifying the story as set in a romantic, exotic land, while also referencing the familiar “Lawrence of Arabia” (Jarmakani, 898). This Arabia is a fictionalized world with easily-identifiable Eastern features. Instead of grounding itself in the real world, sheik romances often conflate culture, religion, and geography to create a monolithic Arabia (Jarmakani, 897). The desert, with its sweeping sand dunes and vast, empty space, is often a character in and of itself. Romance is often seen as a form of escapism, and desert romances are seen in much the same way, introducing the reader to a new and unfamiliar world. These stories use the sheik as a traditionally alpha hero, set against a romanticized backdrop of the Middle Eastern world. This paper argues that sheik romances use tropes of Middle Eastern culture to entice readers with the idea of a foreign and exotic culture while providing enough familiarity to maintain expectations of the Middle East. There is inherent conflict in this situation: a clash of cultures, set against the backdrop of a foreign land, with a hero and heroine that begin with very little in common. Or, in other words: “In an exotic land where it is rumored that men still rule, a tall, dark and handsome sheikh meets a white woman who teaches him how to be ruled by love” (Taylor, 1032). Sheik romances follow a standard storyline: a white, Western heroine travels to a fictional Arab country, meets a sheik, and ultimately falls in love with him. By providing a new and unique spin on the traditional Eurocentric romance, sheik romances have carved out a small but significant niche in the romance market. However, in terms of romance novels set outside the Western world, sheik romances constitute almost the entire subgenre (Holden, 3). Given that 18 billion romance novels are sold each year, though, sheik romances still make up less than 0.5% of the current market (Teo, 241). In 2005 alone, over 51 million copies of sheik romances were sold around the world (Teo, 241). They are a small but growing portion of the romance market: Harlequin and Silhouette, two of the biggest names in romance publishing, have published at least 80 sheik romances since 2001 (Holden, 2). Hull’s 1919 novel The Sheik, have seen an increase in popularity in recent years (Raub, 119). Sheik romances, first popularized by E.M. Middle Eastern Representation in Romance Fiction
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