PROFILE
EDWARD W. SAID
A Disciple's Tribute
By Hakem Rustom
Perhaps the most suitable word to describe my relationship with Professor Edward Said is that of a disciple. The guru becomes a realization of the
disciple's highest ideals and an embodiment of a path. Through his life and work, Said has set new standards in ethics, academia and politics, becoming
a source of inspiration for many through his books, lectures, and above all, his person.
Said had the courage to take sides, he never allowed superficial and apathetic neutrality to stop him from voicing the truth. His position was
clear; he always critiqued systems and institutions that subjugated people to oppression and humiliation.
I find myself instinctively on the other
side of power he once said in an interview. He criticized ruthlessly Israel's
humiliation of and war crimes against the Palestinians; he broke relations with Arafat when he compromised Palestinian rights and refused a
White House invitation after signing the Oslo Accords.
From US imperial policies to the corruption of Arab regimes, Said was a thorn in the side of power, and to his credit, he was disliked by the power
apparatus on all sides. His books were banned by some Arab states including the Palestinian Authority, while the pro-Israeli lobby in the US ironically
called him professor of terror. Said therefore was a man between two seemingly conflicting worlds. He was
able with his integrity to reconcile cultural coexistence, which power has corrupted. He toured the west articulating the finest voice of the
Palestinian narrative of exile and dispossession, while speaking to Arabs about the Jewish experience of anti-Semitic racism in Europe. He supported
anti-occupation movements in Palestine and remained committed to his rejection of all forms of violence:
not by suicide
bombs, he said, but by rational argument, mass civil disobedience, and organized protest, here and
everywhere.
Said succeeded in breaking two taboos, the first being the Palestinian narrative, which he once called
America's last taboo until it became part of the international agenda. The second he advocated humanistic exchange
between cultures, in particular between Arabs and Israelis. He once told me,
we must let them [the Israelis] face our reality, and we face
theirs.
Perhaps Said's most remarkable achievement of cultural exchange was the formation in 1999 of the West-Eastern Divan with the renowned
Argentine-Jewish pianist and conductor Daniel Barenboim. The Divan's name was adopted from the poetry of the great German poet Goethe, who fused
European and Islamic poetry. This Divan brings together young talented Arab and Israeli musicians to play every summer in a city of a cultural
significance, starting with Weimar, Goethe's native city, and Seville, a city of a rich mosaic of Jewish, Christian and Muslim cultures during the
Andalucian era of the convivencia (Spanish for "living together").
Said described cultures as diverse and radically hybrid, therefore, they are organic, complex and changeable. Identities and cultures cannot be rigidly
separated and reduced to states, traditions, and civilizational boundaries as Bernard Lewis and Samuel Huntington advocate. Such tight separations
between cultures can only ignite future conflicts and wars. Said's vivid
conception of cultures as diverse and multi-layered was a vision towards an integration between Jews, Christians and Muslims; in which Israelis and
Palestinians as equal citizens in one bi-national secular state and not nineteenth-century form of states based on ethnic purity or religious
exclusivity.
Said's legacy to the humanities and social sciences is his seminal work Orientalism, which was a deconstruction of power in relation to the
knowledge created by imperial Europe about the Arab east. The brilliance and originality of
Said's work created new fields of enquiry such as post-colonial studies. Scholars and journalists alike did not write about
the Arab and Muslim worlds in the same immunity after the publication of
Said's books. He made their task much more difficult because he exposed the ideological agenda behind the production of such reductive knowledge on vast
and diverse cultures.
Most significantly, since the 1980s, Said was in a constant battle with writers such as Lewis, Huntington, Daniel Pipes, Thomas Friedman, and many
others. Such writers justify US exploitative policies in the Arab east by advocating a clash of civilizations, the internal backwardness of Islam and
other sweeping stereotypes about Arabs and Muslims to legitimate military interventions in the region. Said did not only expose their ideological
bankruptcy in his usual rigorous and elegant scholastic manner, he did not mince words in describing their work and the power agendas they serve.
Hakem
Rustom with Prof. Said at King’s College, Cambridge. November 2002
My last encounter with him was last November in Cambridge, where he was delivering a series of lectures on humanism and knowledge. He made every effort to arrange to meet with me. This is despite his busy schedule of meetings and hospital treatment, which consumed much of his energy. After a couple of phone conversations, we agreed to meet shortly after his seminar on Vico at King's College.
After a long seminar, he asked me in a gentle tone, "is it still alright with you to meet
now?" I was shocked by his concern for my well-being after a long seminar, and he is the man with Leukemia. I told him that I was just
about to ask him the same question. We walked into the College lounge, where he invited me to sit and asked me, "would you like some wine?" I replied
affirmatively, asking if I should get the glasses. "No, no," he said, "I will get them, you sit down. Do you like cherry wine?" I felt very
privileged and content.
We sat for an hour, talking about many personal concerns as an Arab-Canadian who is seeking an academic future. He then spoke with disdain about
intellectuals who change sides by the end of their career; from being critical of power to becoming its advocates. Soon after, Mariam, his wife,
joined us. After a short conversation, he put his arm around her shoulders and told me,
my love bird. I realized how strong and sincere he was. Not
for a minute, did he allow his illness to prevent him from doing what really mattered in his life. He was a dove with the power of an eagle.
Said reached near the highest possible step of integrity, genius, and elegance a man could achieve. He was a man of style, who had a special twist
to things, especially in the way he received people, the powerful satirical language he used, and even the way he dressed. He expressed genuine care for
friends and strangers alike. Above all, he never compromised; he fulfilled
his duty to perfection till the last days. As many of his friends, colleagues and students said in the last few weeks, we are indeed orphaned.
It is hard to imagine a second Edward Said. People of his quality make a single entry in human history, and like prophets, he joined the camp of the
oppressed and left behind him both fragrance and fire. It is only true disciples who realize the duty of such discipleship. Said's legacy is a path
and a torch for us to proceed forward on.
After Edward Said's journey, the path is paved and more lit, but he will be dearly missed.
Hakem Rustom, BSc, BA honours (Dalhousie), MSc in social anthropology (London School of Economics). He works in higher education research at the Association of Commonwealth Universities in London. Hakem is co-editing a book - with Adel Iskandar - on Said's intellectual contributions entitled Emancipation and Representation (forthcoming). His email is: hakem2@hotmail.com
