Page "Harem" Paragraph 23

A centuries-old theme in Western culture is the depiction of European women forcibly taken into Oriental harems – evident for example in the Mozart opera Die Entführung aus dem Serail (" The Abduction from the Seraglio ") concerning the attempt of the hero Belmonte to rescue his beloved Konstanze from the seraglio / harem of the Pasha Selim ; or in Voltaire's Candide, in chapter 12 of which the old woman relates her experiences of being sold into harems across the Ottoman Empire.