Diplomatic portraits often reveal the writer’s own anxieties more than they reveal the adversary.

Evidence

Laingen’s message is a functional equivalent of such a portrait. In a different context it would appear a caricature at best, a crude and not particularly damaging attack at worst. It is not even effective as a bit of psy-war, since it reveals the writer’s weaknesses more than his opponent’s. It shows, for example, that the author is extremely nervous about his opposite number, and that he cannot see others except as a mirror image of himself. Where is his capacity for understanding the Iranian point of view or for that matter the Islamic Revolution itself, which one would suppose had been the direct result of intolerable Persian tyranny and the need for overthrowing it? — Edward W. Said, Covering Islam, 105

Categorization

• XREF: Extends Said’s core Orientalism thesis from his earlier book into the diplomatic correspondence genre.