The Legend Dies:
Edward Said
1935-2003 

He was a man with many dimensions able 
to combine a rigorous intellectual life and political presence.

Palestinian-Arab-American intellectual Edward Said died in New York September 25, 2003, at age 67 after a battle with leukemia. 
One of the most influential scholars in the world, Said was also a devoted and beloved teacher to generations of Columbia University students.
He was a professor and author, cultural critic, accomplished pianist, scholar of music and opera, lecturer, Middle East analyst, relentless critic of the Israeli policy of domination, spokesman and advocate of the Palestinian and Arab causes.
He called the Oslo agreement "an instrument of Palestinian surrender." He was a man with many dimensions able to combine a rigorous intellectual life and political presence. He was born in Jerusalem, Palestine, on Nov. 1, 1935 educated in secondary schools there and later in Cairo when he followed his family’s exile to Egypt after the founding of Israel. Said obtained his B.A. from Princeton, and his Ph.D. from Harvard.
He had taught at Columbia University since 1963, and was professor of English and Comparative Literature. He served on the editorial board of 20 journals, and was the general editor of a book series Convergences"  at Harvard University Press. He lectured at over 200 universities in North America, Europe, Africa and Asia, and in 1997 delivered the inaugural set of Empson Lectures at Cambridge University. He was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Royal Society of Literature, and an Honorary Fellow of Kings College, Cambridge, and a member of the PEN Executive Board.
He was awarded numerous prizes and honors, most recently doctorates from the University of Chicago, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Birzeit University, Palestine, the University of Michigan, and in March 1998, the Sultan Owais, UAE, Prize for general cultural achievement; doctorates from the American University in Cairo and the National University of Ireland. He had been visiting professor at Harvard, Yale, and Johns Hopkins.
In late May 1998, he participated with Daniel Barenboim and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in a new production of Beethoven’s Fidelio for which he wrote a new English text replacing all the spoken dialogue. In August 1999, with Daniel Barenboim and Yo-Yo Ma, he conducted a workshop for young Arab and Israeli musicians in Weimar, Germany.
Between 1977 and 1991, he was a member of the Palestine National Council. In November 1999 he was awarded the first Spinoza Prize given in the Netherlands. The themes he presented remain universal across literally centuries nationalism, the individual versus society, moral choices, majority versus minority rights, and political repression.
He is the author of 17 books which have been translated into 26 languages. His books include: Intention and Method (1975), Beginnings (1975); Orientalism (1978); The Question of Palestine (1980); Covering Islam (1981); The World, the Text and the Critic (1983); After the Last Sky (1986); Blaming the Victims (1987Musical Elaborations (1991); Culture and Imperialism (1992), and The Politics of Dispossession (1995). His books extended his criticism of Western attitudes toward the Palestinians but also portrayed the Palestinian leadership as profligate and corrupt. Peace and Its Discontents appeared in 1996, Out of Place: A Memoir in 1999, and The End of the Peace Process: Oslo and After in 2000. Reflections on Exile appeared in 2000; as well as The Edward Said Reader, and in 2001, Power, Politics and Culture.
His Wellek and Reith Lectures were published as, respectively, Musical Elaborations and Representations of the Intellectual.
Professor Said also received honorary doctorates from Jami’a Malleyeh, Toronto, Guelph, Edingburgh, Haverford, Warwick, and Exeter universities. He twice received Columbia’s Trilling Award and the Wellek Prize of the American Comparative Literature Association, and was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, the Real Society of Literature, King’s College, Cambridge, and an Honorary Fellow of the Middle East Studies Association. In 1999 he was President of Modern Languages Association.
He also was vilified as the professor of terror. The Jewish Defense League called him a Nazi. His office at Columbia was set on fire in 1985, and both he and his family received innumerable death threats,” he wrote in his memoir. He is survived by his wife Mariam.
His death was reported by major American, Arab and world press. The following are a few comments presented by those who valued his intellectual contributions to education, peace and understanding of the Palestinian cause:

Dr. Lee Bollinger, President of Columbia University: Edward Said was a man of enormous intellectual distinction. He was devoted to, and intimately engaged with, works of art, especially the novel and the poem. He was a humanist who believed that such study is essential to a good and meaningful life. And through his writings and teaching, he transformed our sense of ourselves by forcing us in the Western world to confront the implicit assumptions we have about other people around the globe. His death is an irreplaceable loss to the realm of ideas and for those who believe in the redemptive power of the life and mind.

Prof. Hamid Dabashi, Chair of the Middle East and Asian Languages and Cultures, Columbia University: Edward Said’s life has its most immediate bearing as an eloquent testimonial of a people much maligned and brutalized in history. His life and legacy cannot and must not be robbed of that immediacy. It is first and foremost as a Palestinian -- a disenfranchised, dispossessed, disinherited Palestinian -- that Edward Said spoke. The ordinariness of his story -- particularly in those moments when he spoke openly, frankly, innocently of his early youth, adolescence, sibling rivalries, sexual maturity, etc. -- is precisely what restores dignity to a people demonized by a succession of purposeful propaganda, dehumanized to be robbed of their homeland in the broad daylight of history. No assessment of his multifaceted achievements as a teacher, a critic, and a scholar, no laudatory endorsement of his universal humanism, no perfectly deserving appreciation of him as a musician, an essayist, a subaltern theorist, a political activist, etc. -- Said was not just a Palestinian. But he made every one else look like a Palestinian: made homeless by the mad logic of a brutal game of power that has robbed the whole world of any semblance of permanence. How to remain an incessantly moral voice in a morally impermanent world, how to transfigure the disfigured mutations of the world into a well-mannered measure of truth, how to dismantle the power that false knowledge projects and yet insist that the just is right and the truth is beautiful -- that is the legacy of Edward Said, right from the mountain top of his majestic peak visible from afar, down to the slopes of his bountiful pastures which few fortunate souls were blessed to call home.

Dr. Hanan Ashrawi, a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council and the secretary-general of the Palestinian Initiative for the Promotion of Global Dialogue and Democracy (MIFTAH): Edward was amazingly human, vulnerable in his larger-than-life status to all the personal pain and doubts that beset ordinary mortals, and never too self-preoccupied to let you gain entry to his life unnoticed. He had a thunderous impatience with the obtuseness and deliberate ignorance of most Western media who insisted on reducing reality to an inane sound byte or a tepid dose of processed language. He had a gentle identification with the oppressed and an intimidating rage against the oppressor, a warm embrace for the victim and a cold rejection of the culprit, a love for the post-apartheid South Africa and all that its struggle stood for, and a total loathing for discrimination, racism and the degradation of human life and rights. For a man who has been described as the conscience of Palestine, his ultimate absence requires the greater affirmation of all that he had represented, both in the consciousness of a nation and in the hearts of those who loved him. 

Dr. Clovis Maksoud, Director of the Center for the Global South at American University: This is an opportunity to revisit his legacy, to be guided by his contributions, and to be further enriched by constantly examining the meaning of his commitment to human liberation. This, however, had sustainable relevance and an enduring impact because the lucid text articulated and amplified the just causes which he identified with and indeed personified. In this respect Palestine encapsulated the serious threat to the quest for justice and dignity. He confronted the onslaught on the Palestinian people, not only because he was one of them but because justice denied in his patrimony undermines the prospect of justice everywhere. This makes understandable his vehement critique of the Oslo and Camp David processes. Edward held firm that mitigating and eliminating the insufferable injustice Palestinians experience would empower Israelis and the Jewish community to recover their dynamic humanist values and traditions from the distortions that Israeli behavior and ruthlessness has caused. This explains his ongoing relevance as an inspiration to the hundreds of thousands of young people to remain upbeat amidst their frustrations and their unfulfilled expectations. This is why Edward Said will remain for generations to come a guiding force for the Arab renaissance project and the teacher of the thousands of students and all who have been graced by the warmth of his friendship and generosity of spirit. We will not miss the Arab gift to human culture and intellectual integrity, because Edward Said’s legacy will remain throbbing in our conscious for generations to come. Thus while we miss Edward in our moments of self centeredness, his legacy will remain that of Edward Wadih Said, a major contributor to the world’s growing constituency of conscience.

Mohamed Hassanein Heikal, a political analyst, scholar and former chairman of the board of Al-Ahram Egyptian newspaper: No words can express the great loss to thought in general, and for the notion of freedom in particular, to which the death of Edward Said has given rise. He was also, perhaps more importantly, a Jerusalemite. The issues of his country traveled with him wherever he went. His monumental, telling and revealing Orientalism is the book that forced the world to concede that his struggle was valid and true. Edward Said was subjected to a vicious campaign perpetrated by pro-Israeli groups unsettled by his influence, one that gave rise to various responses that demonstrated the extent of his contribution. Yet such campaigns did not stop him for in his heart of hearts he was after peace. He sought a just, sustainable peace.
When a teacher chooses to use his (intellectual) ammunition in the wider world, forgoing the slow influence that can be made in the academic context, that teacher displays a desire to keep up with events, to reach into the future and beat a death he knows is awaiting him: a vision of greatness irrespective of viewpoint.
Prof. Naseer Aruri, former Chairman of the Department of Political Science, University of Massachusetts: The passing of Edward Said saddens us all because he was a voice for the ideas, hopes and visions that we hold true and cherish. His remarkable ability to express himself in several languages and various forums was a constant thorn in the side of those who wished to silence our voices, continue our dispossession, and destroy our will to be free. His message was that of universalism, not chauvinism, freedom, not subjugation, idealism, not self-interest. He will be sorely missed by all of us, who will feel empty in the absence of this giant, who articulated our aspirations and presented our case in ways that no one else could. Edward Said was one of the 20th century’s greatest thinkers, a unique person who made his mark in numerous fields and across many disciplines: an internationally renowned literary and cultural critic, a philosopher of history, a music critic, a Middle East specialist, a political theorist, an activist, and a voice of humane conscience. One of his former students, Frank Motely, who became a dean at Iowa University School of Law described Edward quite accurately as follows: What made Edward so special was that he never succumbed to the seduction of accommodation with those in power. He always remained true to his ideas no matter the personal cost. 

Mary Rose Oakar, President of the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) said: Edward Said was a giant figure in the Arab-American community, and for Arabs in the Middle East and across the world. We relied heavily on his wisdom and guidance in our work over the years, and counted on his invaluable counsel and support. He is an irreplaceable treasure, and we shall miss him beyond measure.

Dr. Ziad Asali, President of the American Task Force for Palestine: Edward Said will be remembered as the model of integration for Arab-Americans. His fluid comfort in both cultures was astounding to behold and it came from a very simple source. He was an American and being one gave him personal and political freedom, a fully functional model of the rule of law and the opportunity for success in his chosen profession. He was both because each fed him and contributed to his integrity as a human being as much as having two arms or eyes did. And Edward Said’s commitment to a full pied to let you gain entry to his life unnoticed. He had a thunderous impatience with the obtuseness and deliberate ignorance of most Western media who insisted on reducing reality to an inane sound byte or a tepid dose of processed language. He had a gentle identification with the oppressed and an intimidating rage against the oppressor, a warm embrace for the victim and a cold rejection of the culprit, a love for the post-apartheid South Africa and all that its struggle stood for, and a total loathing for discrimination, racism and the degradation of human life and rights. For a man who has been described as “the conscience of Palestine,” his ultimate absence requires the greater affirmation of all that he had represented, both in the consciousness of a nation and in the hearts of those who loved him. 

Mahmoud Darwish, Palestinian poet, writer and former member of the PLO Executive Committee: I cannot bid Edward Said farewell, so present is he among and within us and in the world at large, so alive. Any Palestinian asked what he was proud of in the contemporary world would undoubtedly reply, “Edward Said.” In the cultural arena Palestine never gave birth to anything of such genius, or such a unique plurality, as Edward Said.
At present, and until further notice, he will be credited with transferring the name of his native country from the common plane of politics to that of universal cultural consciousness. His perspective on the conflict that rages there is both cultural and moral, it not only justifies the Palestinians’ right to resistance but views it as a national and human duty. Seldom does one encounter a person in whom the intellectual and the star combine in the way they did in Edward, a dashing presence, as eloquent and profound as he was fierce and lucid, maintaining a steadfast fascination with the aesthetics of life and language.

Dr. Michael C. Hudson, Chair, CCAS at Georgetown University: Edward Said was a thinker who liberated Middle East studies from parochialism and prejudice. He laid the intellectual groundwork for a more nuanced, deeper understanding of the region’s culture, society, and politics. He challenged and dismantled prevailing paradigms in Middle East studies and opened the door to a truer understanding of the region. Two generations of Middle East scholars are now indebted to Said for the new avenues of inquiry and inspiration he provided, and for his generosity of time and attention to students and colleagues. Yet his passion for understanding never dulled his critical eye. He was among the most acerbic commentators on the contemporary ills of the Arab world--authoritarianism, corruption, human rights abuses, and underdevelopment. His passing occurs at a particularly unfortunate moment, when public debate about the Arab and Muslim worlds is once again laced with racism and Islamophobia. We at Georgetown, and especially at the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, were proud to have Edward Said as a colleague, friend, and model. As students of the Arab and Islamic worlds, our loss is especially acute. But the fields of comparative literature, cultural theory, post-colonial studies, world history, and musicology are also mourning the loss of a towering intellect who made major contributions in these domains.

Daniel Barenboim, an Israeli pianist and Chief Conductor for Life of the Staatskapelle Berlin, coordinated a concert with Edward Said: Perhaps the first thing one remembers about Edward Said was his breadth of interest. He was not only at home in music, literature, philosophy, or the understanding of politics, but also he was one of those rare people who saw the connections and the parallels between different disciplines, because he had an unusual understanding of the human spirit, and of the human being. He was critical of the inability of Israeli leaders to make the necessary symbolic gestures that have to precede any political solution. It was a combination of all these qualities which led him to found together with me the West-Eastern Divan, which provides a forum for young Israeli and Arab musicians to learn together music and all its ramifications. The Palestinians have lost one of the most eloquent defenders of their aspirations. The Israelis have lost an adversary -- but a fair and humane one. And I have lost a soul mate.

George Hishmeh, editor and syndicated writer: Said’s intellect and genius was recognized in the West early on -- a beacon that helped many find their way in this turbulent world. The best way to honor Edward Said is to spread his message, probably by establishing academic chairs in his name at various institutions of higher learning, especially in Palestine. His loss has robbed the world of an articulate champion of the dispossessed, especially the Palestinians, and an internationally recognized literary critic and classical pianist. The legacy of Said, a prolific writer and diehard activist, will undoubtedly leave an indelible mark on both academic and international affairs.

Abdelwahab Badrakhan, deputy editor of Al Hayat Lebanese daily, said: We lost a peak of Arab intellect. Edward Said set himself apart by knowing the feelings of the street. He articulated the basis for Palestinian patriotism and added to his fundamental rejection of Zionism the idea of Palestinian-Israeli coexistence.

Najeeb Nabil Khoury, Esq., a young attorney of Glendale, California: In the wake of Edward Said’s death, many apt words were written about the impact of his passing. The Palestinian cause lost one of its most eloquent speakers. Arab-Americans lost a shining light in their adopted homeland. Academia lost a bright star. One commentator movingly stated that the world was a lesser place because of Said’s death. All these comments honestly honor Said’s importance. However, lost in these sentiments is Edward Said’s living spirit, which continues to give. Often those not intimately connected to Palestine falsely identify the Palestinian cause with harboring grievances and living in the past. As a result, many associate Said, the most prominent Palestinian-American voice, with clinging to the evils of colonialism, blaming the West, and fostering ethnic division. Ironically, nothing could be further from the truth. It is true that, throughout his life, Said gave voice to the voiceless. But he always did so with a desire for a brighter future with an eye that beautifully and imaginatively saw new possibilities. Until his death, he stated that he never felt so defeated as to lose hope. This is because he always dreamed of a world where borders and definitions ceased destroying innumerable lives. If we are to honor Said’s life, we must celebrate hope, humaneness and possibility. We must celebrate these finest parts of the Palestinian cause.

Ramzy Baroud, a syndicated journalist: Said stood for everything that is virtuous. His moral stance was more than a wealth of essays, books, prose and music. It was manifested more evidently in his gentle, kind persona. His intellectual capabilities, thoughtfulness and genius were inimitable. And because of that, he was a target for those who wish to silence every voice that utters the taboo words of truth. Said’s words dug deep into our hearts, broke the boundaries of culture, religion and politics. He tackled our humanity before reaching out to our minds.

Joseph R. Haiek, Publisher of The News Circle/Arab-American Affairs magazine: The legendary life and contributions of Edward Said will be perpetuated in our magazine, reference books, website and planned documentaries. On behalf of The News Circle advisory board and the editorial team, we extend our condolences to his wife Mariam and children, Wadi and Najla.

For additional biographical data, visit:  www.edwardsaid.org