Orientalism: History, Theory and the Arts

by John M. MacKenzie

The Orientalism debate, inspired by the work of Edward Said, has been a major source of cross-disciplinary controversy in recent years. John Mackenzie offers a comprehensive re-evaluation of the vast literature on Orientalism, bringing to the subject some highly original historical perspectives. The book provides the first major discussion of Orientalism by a historian of imperialism. Setting the analysis within the context of conflicting scholarly interpretations, Mackenzie carries the discussion into wholly new areas, testing the notion that the Western arts received genuine inspiration from the East by examining the visual arts, architecture, design, music, and theater.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Art, Art History

256 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

John M. MacKenzie is Emeritus Professor of imperial history at Lancaster University and holds honorary professorships at the University of Aberdeen, St. Andrew and Edinburgh. He has published on many aspects of the cultural and environmental history of the British Empire. He edited the Manchester University Press Studies in Imperialism series for thirty years. He was Editor-in-Chief of the four volume Wiley-Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Empire and is Editor-in-Chief of the journal Britain in the World.

Reviews

[Anne · Rating 2 out of 5]

MacKenzie's invective against Edward Said's Orientalism reads more like a laundry list of complaints and transgressions than it does a well-reasoned critique of a fundamentally flawed component of the modern imperial historiographic canon. While MacKenzie raises many valid concerns, his rhetoric places him at the mercy of the same critical eye to which he subjects Said. Said, much to his credit, fought an above-board battle, whereas MacKenzie strays frequently down the same ill-fated, spittle-spewing path of Bernard Lewis.

[Syafiqah · Rating 2 out of 5]

MacKenzie tried to refute the Saidist reading of Orientalist art, but more often than not he seems to be shooting himself in the foot. He has some valid points to be considered, granted, but even those are not enough to save this book.

[David · Rating 1 out of 5]

MacKenzie's attack on Said comically misunderstands the thing it is he thinks he's attacking, but he must have capitalised handsomely on the title. I myself somehow ended up with two copies.

[Msd]

a great critique

[Thorlakur · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is an argument against and a reply to the seminal work of Edward Said. Mr. MacKenzie makes some original points himself. The book suffers because of poor illustration, and for some strange reason he omits orientalism in literature, even though his work deals with most of the major arts.

[Mir · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the nineteenth-century ‘battle of styles’ between Gothic and classical, the Orientalist interest constituted a set of relatively minor, geographically distant and virtually unrelated skirmishes.

[Jenny]

This really is a fairly good book on the topic...I am not sure if I could say the same for the topic itself.