Deserialize<T>

public static T Deserialize<T>(this XDocument xmlDocument)
{
	XmlSerializer xmlSerializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(T));
	using (XmlReader reader = xmlDocument.CreateReader())
		return (T)xmlSerializer.Deserialize(reader);
}

string hi = "hello world";
string xml = hi.SerializeToXml();
Console.WriteLine(xml);

string hi2 = XDocument.Parse(xml).Deserialize<string>();
Console.WriteLine(hi2);

Output:

<string>hello world</string>
hello world