Mimesis and Empire The New World, Islam, and European Identities [Hardcover]

This 2001 book offers a comparative look at European and New World early modern culture.Here the author explores the dynamics of imitation among early modern European powers in literary and historiographical texts from sixteenth and early seventeenth-century Spain, Italy, England, and the New World. The book considers a broad sweep of material, including European representations of New World subjects and of Islam. It supplements the transatlantic perspective on early modern imperialism with an awareness of the situation in the Mediterranean and considers problems of reading and literary transmission; imperial ideology and colonial identities; counterfeits and forgery; and piracy.Here the author explores the dynamics of imitation among early modern European powers in literary and historiographical texts from sixteenth and early seventeenth-century Spain, Italy, England, and the New World. The book considers a broad sweep of material, including European representations of New World subjects and of Islam. It supplements the transatlantic perspective on early modern imperialism with an awareness of the situation in the Mediterranean and considers problems of reading and literary transmission; imperial ideology and colonial identities; counterfeits and forgery; and piracy.Here the author explores the dynamics of imitation among early modern European powers in literary and historiographical texts from sixteenth and early seventeenth-century Spain, Italy, England, and the New World. The book considers a broad sweep of material, including European representations of New World subjects and of Islam. It supplements the transatlantic perspective on early modern imperialism with an awareness of the situation in the Mediterranean and considers problems of reading and literary transmission; imperial ideology and colonial identities; counterfeits and forgery; and piracy.Introduction; 1. Truth, fictions, and the New World; 2. Literary loyalties, imperial betrayals; 3. Lettered subjl#”