More Bernard Lewis

Most of my Bernard Lewis posts involve ritual praise for his abilities as a historian, followed by a thorough condemnation of his political views. Just to flesh out the first part of that, here's a profile of him by his former student Martin Kramer from the Encyclopedia of Historians and Historical Writing. Here's a key paragraph:

"Lewis drew upon the reservoir of Orientalism, with its emphasis on philology, culture, and religion. But while Lewis possessed all the tools of Orientalist scholarship—his work displayed an astonishing mastery of languages—he was a historian by training and discipline, intimately familiar with new trends in historical writing. He was one of the very first historians (along with the Frenchman Claude Cahen) to apply new approaches in economic and social history to the Islamic world. While a student in Paris, Lewis had a brief encounter with the Annales school, which inspired an early and influential article on guilds in Islamic history. A youthful Marxism colored his first book, The Origins of Ismailism (his doctorate for the University of London, where he taught for thirty years). He subsequently jettisoned this approach, refusing the straightjacket of any overarching theory. But his studies of dissident Muslim sects, slaves, and Jews in Muslim societies broke new ground by expanding the scope of history beyond the palace and the mosque."

I think part of the reason Lewis is such a lightning-rod is that he far outstrips the ability of most Middle Easternists to write for a general audience. The very excellent works by scholars like Ira Lapidus and Albert Hourani just don't have the same artistic flair. This is why Lewis is so influential, and why so many people continually cite him as The Voice of Authority on all matters related to the Middle East and Islam. Most historians today disagree with him for a lot of very sound scholarly reasons, as I have discussed before, but I think the key to advancing those perspectives outside the academy is to find ways to reach the general public in the same manner. The only person I can think of presently doing so is Karen Armstrong, who works from outside higher education and concentrates solely on writing for non-specialists.

UPDATE: Now see, this isn't exactly what I had in mind. Students at Columbia College are being taught to write in the style of Michel Foucault. As a Ph.D. student, I can hardly read the style of Michel Foucault. Via Martin Kramer.