Quotes About Edward Said

Como señaló Edward Said2 antes que nadie, Arafat ya había concedido Jerusalén; ya había acordado que el asunto solamente se discutiría durante las negociaciones del «estatuto final». Así fue como la ciudad quedó excluida del sistema de «zonas» y quedó en su conjunto en manos israelíes.

Out-of-step intellectuals like Noam Chomsky and the deceased Edward Said have often been dismissed as crazy extremists, 'anti-American,' and in Mr. Said's case even, absurdly, as apologists for Palestinian 'terrorism.'

Yes, it's true. Few intellectuals fuse intellectual power with deep moral concern and political engagement. Edward Said is somebody that comes to mind, but for every Edward Said there are one hundred and fifty academicians who, albeit interesting and competent, are narrow. So it follows that for every bell hooks there are one hundred and fifty academics threatened by your poly-vocality.

In a public dialogue with Salman in London he [Edward Said] had once described the Palestinian plight as one where his people, expelled and dispossessed by Jewish victors, were in the unique historical position of being 'the victims of the victims': there was something quasi-Christian, I thought, in the apparent humility of that statement.

As the late Edward W Said wrote after the attack on the World Trade Center, 'Western humanism is not enough: we need a universal humanism.' I agree with that. The question is how to get it, and my own view is that it can't be had unless we raise our demands on ourselves a long way beyond decorating our lives with enough cultivation to make the pursuit of ambition look civilized.