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Title: Beautiful and nuanced
Review: Despite its size, this brief collection of lectures comprises a nuanced and compelling argument of how to rescue the humanities from their growing marginalization and irrelevance. Calling for a return to philology and criticizing the jargon-laden obscuratinism and relativism of much of contemporary humanistic practice, Said nevertheless maintains the benefit of close readings of texts and a multiculturalism that consists of expanding the canon rather than tossing it out all together -- in contrast to the willful ignorance of other cultures advocated by the likes of Harold Bloom and Bernard Lewis.Said also updates and expands on his views of the intellectual in public life which he touched upon in the series of lectures "Representations of the Intellectual." I found these parts quite interesting. However, if you don't hold the same views as the Old Left, you will need to substitute your own discontents for some of his particulars.
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