Edward Said passes away

I found out tonight that Edward Said passed away after a battle with leukemia. Recent reports describe Said as a leading US-based advocate for Palestine, but it seems to me that this only begins to describe a man who was easily one of most important public intellectuals of his generation.

From the VOA News report of Said's passing:

He wrote more than a dozen books on topics ranging from politics to literature, music and Freud. His 1978 work Orientalism focused on the way the West historically "came to terms" with the so-called "Muslim Orient.” The book helped launch a new academic field of post-colonial studies.

Mr. Ibish says that in his writing and lectures, Edward Said worked vigorously to foster understanding between Arab and American societies.

“Said, although he was completely fluent in both Western and Arab cultures, often said he never felt fully at home in either of them,” he said. “And so, from this de-centered perspective, he tried, I think, as much as he could, to provide a bridge between increasingly alienated Arab and American societies to explain the one to the other.”

And from the Guardian:

Salman Rushdie once said of Said that he "reads the world as closely as he reads books".

The Irish critic Seamus Deane described him as: "That rare figure: a truly public intellectual who has a powerful influence within the academy and also a potent public presence. He's a very brilliant reader, of both texts and political situations."