In Defense of Travel Writing About Islam
Travel Blog • Jim Benning • 05.24.07 | 2:01 PM ET
In Orientalism, Edward Said took to task many Western writers for their accounts of Islam, and particularly many travel writers. But Said didn’t get it right, writes Algis Valiunas in a lengthy essay in the Claremont Review of Books.
“The Western encounter with Islam goes back to the Middle Ages, but even if we follow Said and confine our attention to the past two centuries or so, the picture that emerges is far different from the one painted in ‘Orientalism,’” Valiunas writes. “The travel literature is far more open-minded and perceptive than Said’s animadversions suggest, and besides, he leaves out important figures like Alexis de Tocqueville, John Lloyd Stephens, Mark Twain, and Robert Byron. These writers were all earnest searchers after Islamic civilization, and contrary to Said’s caricature, what they observed can instruct us still.”
Related on World Hum:
* A Tale of Two Twains
* No. 9: ‘The Innocents Abroad’ by Mark Twain
* No. 2: ‘The Road to Oxiana’ by Robert Byron
* No. 1: ‘Arabian Sands’ by Wilfred Thesiger
* Truth in Oxiana
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Jim Benning is the editor and co-founder of World Hum.
Türkei 02.17.08 | 3:14 PM ET
Thank you