Summary
Builder of the Suez Canal, whose project Said treats in Chapter One, III of Orientalism as the geopolitical project issuing from the Napoleonic expedition and the logical conclusion of Orientalist thought and effort: de Lesseps melted away the Orient’s geographical identity and dispelled the threat of Islam (Orientalism (1978), PDF p.97-101 / printed p.88-92).
Details
- His father Mathieu de Lesseps had come to Egypt with Napoleon and remained there for four years after the French evacuated in 1801; Ferdinand returned to Egypt in 1854 to embark on the canal undertaking, completed fifteen years later, with no real engineering background but a tremendous faith in his near-divine skills as builder, mover and creator (Orientalism (1978), PDF p.98 / printed p.89).
- The investment company he formed in 1858 was the Compagnie universelle; his project, his “pensée morale”, promised, as he told contributors in 1860, les immenses services que le rapprochement de l’occident et de l’orient doit rendre à la civilization et au développement de la richesse générale (Orientalism (1978), PDF p.98-99 / printed p.89-90).
- The canal, in Said’s presentation, was a project able to override the objections of those consulted and, in improving the Orient as a whole, to do what scheming Egyptians, perfidious Chinese and half-naked Indians could never have done for themselves; the opening ceremonies in November 1869 embodied his theatrical vocabulary — we created, fought, disposed, achieved, acted, recognized, persevered, advanced (Orientalism (1978), PDF p.99-100 / printed p.90-91).
- In July 1956 Gamal Abdel Nasser activated Egypt’s taking over of the canal by pronouncing the name of de Lesseps (Orientalism (1978), PDF p.100 / printed p.91).
Related pages
Orientalism (1978), Suez Canal, Napoleon Bonaparte, Textual attitude