The Orient is not only a place where the mental development of people is arrested at the level of a child; it is also a place of sages, an old place. As Zizek writes, "What characterizes the European civilization is… its ex-centered character-the notion that the ultimate pillar of Wisdom, the secret agalma, the spiritual treasure, the lost object- cause of desire, which we in the West long ago betrayed, could be recuperated out there, in the forbidden exotic place" (2001, 67-68; emphasis in original).

Association of the East with wisdom and spirituality, through the technique that may be called gerontification, is well exemplified in the case of Tibet. It is often the place, not the people, that is rendered wise on account of its age. Though Madame Blavatsky (1892) and Kipling (through his lama figure in Kim) were instrumental in bringing together the idea of Tibet with the search for wisdom and spirituality, it is in the twentieth century that this association gathered a momentum of its own. After living the life of Tibetan mystic for a few years, David-Neel felt that the natural edifices like mountains and valleys in the Himalayan region conveyed a mysterious message to her and wrote in her account, originally published in 1921: "What I heard was the thousand-year old echo of thoughts which are re-thought over and over again in the East, and which, nowadays, appear to have fixed their stronghold in the majestic heights of Thibet" (1991, 24). Describing his escape from the Spanish prison camp to Tibet, Riencourt equated it "as an escape from the inferno of wars and concentration camps, searching for this forbidden land of mystery, the only place of earth where wisdom and happiness seemed to be a reality" (1950, 4). Many well-intentioned liberals in the West today are likely to agree with Thurman's extolling of the virtues of Tibet as a uniquely spiritual civilization:

While Western and Tibetan personalities share the complex of modernity of consciousness, they are diametrically opposed in outlook, one focused on matter and the other on mind… While the American national purpose is ever greater material productivity, the Tibetan national purpose is ever greater spiritual productivity. (1998, 10-11)

The various strategies identified so far have been characterized by a sense of affirmation: affirmation of narcissism in the name of moral superiority. Landon, in the aftermath of the massacre of Tibetan at Guru during the British Tibet mission of 1903-4, said,

The resistance of the Tibetans had been blown away before us like leaves in autumn, and there was not a man in the country who did not realise that our care of the wounded afterwards, was as thorough as the punishment we inflicted at the moment. Trade and credit are proverbially plants of slow growth, and slower in the East than anywhere else. (in Sharma and Sharma 1996, 35)

The Orient is seen by the Europeans as "a pretext for self-dramatisation and differentness," a "malleable theatrical space in which can be played out the egocentric fantasies" thus affording "endless material for the imagination, and endless potential for the Occidental self" (Kabbani 1986, 11). Authority and control were justified by affirming inherently racist and self-serving ideas like the "white man's burden" and "manifest destiny" in the colonial period. Representation of the Other as irrational, immoral, inefficient, and duplicitous affirms self-representation as rational, moral, efficient, and honest. The sense of affirmation can be seen not only in overtly aggressive imperialist writings but also in those with more humanitarian and liberal content. The significance of essentialist and stereotypical representations of the Other lay not in the intentions of the representer but in the effects on the represented. In their own different ways, aggressive as well as liberal imperialist impulses established and institutionalized control through mobilization of similar yet contradictory representations, production of knowledge, bureaucratic modes of governance, and use of coercive force.

Though affirmation of the Western Self was the ultimate force behind most representations, some also used specific representations to question the Self. That is, representations of the non-Western Other have sometimes been deployed in the service of self-criticism. This can be seen in the case of Western representations of Tibet, especially after the turn of the nineteenth century. "I delightedly forgot Western lands, that I belonged to them, and that they would probably take me again in the clutches of their sorrowful civilization," said David-Neel in 1921 (1991, 61). However, the use of the Other to offer criticism of the Self is not necessarily emancipatory for the represented Other. The differing and even noble intentions of some of those who practiced positive stereotyping of the Other do not preclude the fact that their impact on the exoticized represented was often predictably the same-a prelude to control, dominance, and exploitation. They function in a variety of imperial contexts as a mechanism of aesthetic substitution that "replaces the impress of power with the blandishments of curiosity" (Said 1993, 159). Thus, Tibet remains a service society for the West, offering resources by which the West can criticize itself, question its values. As Harrer reminds us, Tibetans have "a heritage superior to ours… [they] might bring succour to the pessimism of the West" (1985, 52). More recently, the actor Richard Gere, known for his advocacy of the cause of Tibetans, lamented: "I would say that the West is very young, it's very corrupt. We're not very wise. And I think we're hopeful that there is a place that is ancient and wise and open and filled with light" (Frontline 1998b).

Several strategies of representing the West's Other during the period of European imperialism remain integral to Western representations of the Other even in this postcolonial world, sometimes in more subtle ways. Blatant racism is couched in more acceptable liberal marketable terms. An approach that sees representation as a process is better placed to examine the ways in which the Western discovery and consciousness of the East went hand in hand with Western imperial rule over it. Today, the close link between knowledge production and "national interest" (Weldes 1999), between knowledge and power, remains as close as ever and requires more research and analysis from progressive intellectuals and academics. An understanding of the way non -Western people were represented within the colonial discourse can assist in identifying similar processes that continue in the contemporary world. It will highlight the essentially politicized nature of representations of the Other and representational practices within the political.

The representations of the non-West within Western discourses- both academic and popular-remain enmeshed in asymmetrical power relations. How the West represents its Other continues to be intertwined with its perceived interests and its sense of identity and has a productive impact on the represented. In the case of Tibetans, Western representation has been a crucial factor in shaping the identity of Tibet as a geopolitical entity as well as shaping the identity of the Tibetans. Before going into the significance of Western representations in chapters 4-6, the next chapter highlights some of the contours of Exotica Tibet by focusing on a selection of cultural sites.