Edward Said: The Last Interview

February 15, 2007
Little Theatre, National Centre for Performing Arts, Mumbai

Prominent Columbia University English and Comparative Literature professor, Edward Said was well known in the United States for his tireless efforts to convey the plight of the Palestinian people, and in this film shot less than a year before his death resulting from incurable leukemia, the author of such books as Orientalism, Culture and Imperialism, and Power Politics, and Culture discusses with filmmakers his illness, his life, his education, and the continuing turmoil in Palestine. Diagnosed with the disease in 1991, Said struggled with his leukemia throughout the 1990s before refraining from interviews due to his increasingly fragile physical state. This interview was the one sole exception to his staunch “no interview” policy and provides fascinating insight into the mind of the man who become Western society’s most prominent spokesman for the Palestinian cause.