Arab Literary Travels

Introduction: Daniel Grube

I chose the novel Middlesex for my project in order to explore travel outside the borders of the 'Arab' context and expand the notion of travel to the Mediterranean context. Initially when tackling Middlesex, I was overwhelmed with the amount of material that the author, Jeffrey Eugenides, presents the reader. I struggled to create a story, or context, that incorporated all of the material Eugenides deals with in respect to travel. When I was writing about Calliope's transformation into Cal and Hermaphroditus, I realized that there was a theme of travel in the novel outside the literal definition. The mobility in identity. 

My goals for this project are to expand the context of this course from 'Arab' to 'Mediterranean' and explore of the notion of mobility in identity through the novel Middlesex. I will use each plot point in the story map to identify a point in the novel where identity, whether gender, race, ethnicity, transforms or becomes mobile in nature. Through these plot points I will also walk the viewer through the novel Middlesex. Finally, in order to keep with Eugenides' style, each point will bring in historical information to examine identity and travel in a greater historical context. Also within identity, I will also explore the notion of competing identities housed in the same physical or psychological space. "A child of diaspora stands in the threshold of two rooms". I will attempt to reconcile the notion of co-existence and identity as it relates to diaspora, refugee, and gender. The conclusions on identity will reveal something about the greater context of the class terms 'diaspora' and 'refugee' through an examination of identity in Middlesex. 

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