This article explores Said's views of the contemporary French milieu, focusing on an important writer, equally open to wide-ranging interests, Michel Foucault. It analyzes the relationship among some recurring themes in Edward Said (culture, literature, reality, imagination, critical conscience, and intellectual praxis), in their explicit or implicit relation to Foucauldian thought. Foucault's relevance to the Saidian project is assessed with an explanation of how and why Said admired as well as criticized him. **********
