Surveys the history and nature of Western attitudes towards the East, considering orientalism as a powerful European ideological creation - a way for writers, philosophers and colonial administrators to deal with the 'otherness' of eastern culture, customs and beliefs.
Edward W. Said was a university professor at Columbia University. He was born in Jerusalem in 1935 and educated in Egypt and the United States. His other books include The Question of Palestine, Culture and Imperialism and Out of Place: A Memoir.
