This long-awaited collection of literary and cultural essays, the first since Harvard University Press published "The World, the Text, and the Critic" in 1983, reconfirms that Edward Said is the most impressive, consequential, and elegant critic of our time. Taken together, these essays-- from the famous to those that will surprise even Said's most assiduous followers--afford rare insight into the formation of a critic and the development of an intellectual vocation.