Just as the Orient of the Thousand and one Nights is for an average Westerner treacherous yet luring, dangerous yet full of unknown delights, so the harem for him is a mysterious abode where all his sensual dreams come true. Fatima Mernissi begins her autobiographical work Dreams of Trespass by debunking the Westerner’s idea of a harem as place of unrestricted indulgence. For her, a woman who spent her childhood and youth in its confines, a harem had nothing in common with this image of a sensual paradise. Above all, it was a place of hudud, boundaries and (real and imaginary) walls ― upon the freedom to move, to act, to think in a certain way: walls upon walls upon walls. Having painted this image ― all too well known to a well meaning, condescending Westerner ― Mernissi assumes the persona of the witty harem heroine Sharhazade ― and goes West. Instead of a paradise of freedom, however, ― a “freedom” that the West enticingly holds before the eyes of a freedom-seeking Easterner ― Shahrazade finds new walls, new boundaries ― only these walls are more sophisticated and more subtle. In a telling passage, Mernissi describes her astonishment at the discovery that in the West, a woman has to fit the dress, not vice versa. Her Shahrazade Goes West presents a mirror image of the harem; here, the walls and boundaries of the East are replicated by new walls imposed upon a woman’s body, a woman’s mind. In my presentation I look at Mernissi’s use of inverted analogy to showcase the real and imaginary walls that limit women’s lives not only in the patriarchal East but also in the West, to argue for a more nuanced understanding of a woman’s role in the East, and for a more honest understanding of her role in the “emancipated” West. I will also look at the contribution Mernissi’s ideas made to societal change. “You have to learn to scream and protest, just the way you learned to walk and talk.” Viewed in the context of Islamic society, these and other words of Mersnissi are a blueprint for a revolution of values and attitudes. To what extent it has been instrumental in prompting change, will be discussed in the concluding part of my paper.