For Lust of Knowing: The Orientalists and Their Enemies

Whatever specialists thought of Edward Said's Orientalism, published in 1978, the book had major impact on Middle East studies, as Nathan Alexander of Troy University points out. Its thesis was that "Orientalism" was a "hegemonic discourse of imperialism" that "constrains everything that can be written and thought in the West about the Orient, and particularly about Islam and the Arabs." Despite being panned by Arab and non-Arab critics, the book became a best-seller and its author a celebrity. Identifying himself as a Palestinian, Said launched vituperative attacks on his critics and demonized as "racist" those who opposed his views on the Middle East. Irwin, Middle East editor of the Times Literary Supplement, accomplishes two things in his book Dangerous Knowledge. First, the book is a history of "Orientalism," or Western scholarship of the Middle East, India, and the Far East. Irwin begins with the ancient Greeks and concludes with a survey of Arab scholars writing on the Orient today. This magnificent survey covers French, German, Russian, Dutch, English, Latin, and Arabic scholarship. Irwin argues that while interest in the Orient was often influenced by Western Christianity, Western interest in the Islamic world was, for the most part, of negligible cultural significance. When scholarship on the Orient increased in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the "Orientalists" tended to either exaggerate the virtues of the Orient or be overt anti-imperialists. Irwin's second purpose is to counter the "malignant charlatanry" that lies behind Said's Orientalism. It was unlikely, Irwin writes, that Said bothered to read many of the Orientalists who serve as his arch villains. In fact, Said knew so little of the field he was writing about that he spent much of his time insulting the scholar to whom he was unwittingly most indebted: Bernard Lewis. While Said frequently failed to properly attribute the sources of Orientalism, it is possible he was simply unaware of them. Said's work, Irwin writes, has the merits of a good novel. "It is exciting; it is packed with lots of sinister villains, as well as an outnumbered band of goodies, and the picture that it presents of the world is richly imagined but essentially false." The real question posed by Orientalism is how it ever received acclaim in the first place. It is "a scandal and damning comment on the quality of intellectual life in Britain," he concludes. The same scandal, sadly, exists in the rest of the Western world, and especially the United States, whence the study comes.

This book seems to have been written in large part as a response to the late Edward Said's famous (some would say notorious) Orientalism. In the latter, Said argued the Orientalism (in the limited sense used by Irwin, though Said clearly had a broader use in mind), the scholarly activity of investigating the Orient, is inextricably bound up and indeed is a driver of Western racism, imperialism, and colonialism. Irwin disagrees strongly, and in this decently written book, provides some very good criticism of Said. Irwin attacks Said on a narrow but important front; is Said's account and interpretation of the scholarly tradition of Orientialism correct? Most of Dangerous Knowledge is a chronologically organized history of Western scholarly contact with Arabic traditions. Irwin limits himself primarily to Arabic studies because this is where Said concentrates his critique. Irwin makes a very good case that Said misrepresents this scholarly tradition and misunderstands much of its historic context. According to Irwin, and the examples he cites are convincing, Said appears to have done only a superficial job of examining this tradition, perhaps to the level of not actually reading some of the historic figures criticized. Its worth mentioning that this narrative is worth reading in its own right and that while Irwin has not produced an in depth intellectual history, his historical account is informative and quite readable. In the course of this narrative, Irwin addresses some of Said's broader assertions about the nature of Orientalism and the Western tradition. Most of these criticisms seem well founded. In the last chapters of the book, Irwin turns to specific discussion of other aspects of Said's book and some of his other writings. Irwin continues to be quite critical, and again his critique makes sense. Its important to specify that Irwin, unlike some of Said's critics, does not have a contemporary political axe to grind. Said was best known in this country as an outspoken advocate of the Palestinian cause and critic of the state of Israel. Said's work has been attacked as much for his stands on these issues as for his scholarly work itself. Irwin is careful to specify that he shares many of Said's opinions on these controversial issues. One area where I disagree with Irwin is his repeated statements that Orientalism was written in bad faith, that is to say, Said knowingly produced the distortions and errors characteristic of his book. I find this unlikely. Most great deceptions involve self-deception and it is likely that Said sincerely believed that his interpretations were correct. Said's defect doesn't appear to be insincerity but a lack of intellectual rigor and a preference for highly intellectualized constructs over real data. This conclusion would be consistent with some of Said's other positions. His proposed solution, which he advocated without any irony, to the Israeli-Palestinian problem was a single, democratic

"Dangerous Knowledge" should serve as the standard work about those often quirky scholars in the West who pursued the difficult and mostly little regarded study of the languages and civilizations of the Middle East. However, a history of scholars is unfortunately less interesting than the history itself. "Dangerous Knowledge" seems to have been written largely for an opportunity to refut and criticize the works of the late Edward Said, who famously charged most Western scholarship as tainted by racist and imperialist attitudes. Author Robert Irwin makes a good case that this blanket condemnation is both wrong and unscholarly, and a disservice to our efforts to come to grips with problems that have suddenly become crucial.

I bought this book without realizing that except for the title, it is exactly the same as Irwin's book, "For Lust of Knowing." It has the same number of pages and the same words on each page. If you already have one of these books, you won't need the other! Here is my review of the book. As you will see, I'm explaining the original title in this review. I think I prefer that title, but it isn't all that important. This book is fun to read. It discusses the history of Orientalism and tells about some of the leading Orientalists. It also defends Orientalism as a legitimate scholarly field. And one may want to know why this topic of study needs any defense. The reason becomes clear right from the start. Ed Said wrote a crazy rant against the whole enterprise. That ought to have had little effect on academia. But it did: plenty of people praised that book! And by now, to say that one is an Orientalist is to risk being branded as a servant of Imperialism, and maybe as a Zionistlover as well. I can see that Irwin is not too happy about the decline of Orientalism as a scholarly field. Nor can Irwin be too happy with the discrediting of Middle Eastern Studies that has resulted from the acceptance of Said's nonsense by quite a few supposed intellectuals. That has resulted in Middle Eastern scholars being dismissed by some as a bunch of anti-scholarly racists and bigots who use their positions not to further knowledge but to propagandize against human rights and truth. Irwin is clearly embarrassed by the fact that his field is now associated with Said's polemical work. Yes, those who study the Middle East are under attack from both sides due to the politicization of the field. I have to admit that I'm not the proper person to deliver an attack on Said's book "Orientalism." For one thing, the book is such garbage that I wouldn't know where to start. For another, what I say would count for very little. Not only am I not a scholar in that field, I also am an opponent of Said's entire war on human rights. I see Said as one of the biggest liars of the past century, and I feel that he was a truly evil creature. It would be difficult for me to convince most of those who like Said's works that I could write a genuinely unbiased and fair appraisal of the trash that he wrote. That is one reason why it is good to have a view from an Orientalist who attacks Said on scholarly, rather than political grounds. Irwin certainly does not defend Israel or Zionism, and he defends Said from accusations of supporting terrorism (cleverly claiming that he merely praises terrorism "with faint damns"). I think Irwin is wrong here, but that's not the issue. The question is whether there is any merit in what Said wrote, and how much damage his stuff has done to the field of Orientalism. Irwin says that "it is a scandal and a damning comment on the quality of intellectual life in Britain in recent decades that Said's arguments could ever have been taken seriously." And h

There are giants of scholarship whose greatness is in opening whole new areas of study. There are other figures in scholarship whose claim to fame is in undermining a field of studies , a way of thought. Edward Said's most important work 'Orientalism' discredited the work of generations of Orientalists, all of whom he reinterpeted as tools of British and French colonialism and imperialism. Now Robert Irwin a distinguished Orientalist himself makes an all- out attack on Said's work in a rich and detailed study of the whole scholarly tradition. In it he focuses on the individual stories of great Orientalists such as Postel, Goldhizer and in our day Bernard Lewis and reveals how their dedication to scholarship, to the world of knowledge, and often to the 'exotic societies ' which they studied were the great moving factors in their works. The greatest part of Irwin's book is devoted to providing a detailed record of 'Orientalist scholarship' and only towards the end of the work does Irwin specifically attack the faulty scholarship, and ideological distortions of Said. But this is done not on an ad hominem basis but only in terms of Said's trashing of Orientalist scholarship. This book is filled with fascinating portraits of remarkable individuals, and will be a delight to the general reader.