From a noted journalist who has spent much of his life in Cairo, here is a dazzling cultural excavation of that most ancient, colorful, and multifaceted of cities. The seat of pharaohs and sultans, the prize of conquerors from Alexander to Saladin to Napoleon, Cairo--nicknamed "the Victorious"--has never ceased reinventing herself.With intimate knowlege, humor, and affection, Rodenbeck takes us on an insider's tour of the magnificent city: its backstreets and bazaars, its belly-dan...

**From the Nobel Prize winner and acclaimed author of My Name is Red comes a portrait of Istanbul by its foremost writer, revealing the melancholy that comes of living amid the ruins of a lost empire."Delightful, profound, marvelously origina.... Pamuk tells the story of the city through the eyes of memory." —The Washington Post Book World**A shimmering evocation, by turns intimate and panoramic, of one of the world’s great cities, by its foremost writer. ...

Once upon a time an Indian writer named Amitav Ghosh set out an Indian slave, name unknown, who some seven hundred years before had traveled to the Middle East. The journey took him to a small village in Egypt, where medieval customs coexist with twentieth-century desires and discontents. But even as Ghosh sought to re-create the life of his Indian predecessor, he found himself immersed in those of his modern Egyptian neighbors.Combining shrewd observations with painstaking historic...

"A moving account of the harrowing experience of one woman who almost met her death in a culture that could not be more alien to her American upbringing." —Ayaan Hirsi Ali, author of Infidel and NomadNational Jewish Book Award Winner"A poignant and fascinating account that has many lessons for women—and men—of all cultures." — The Huffington...

A fascinating illustrated history of one of the strangest, and cruelest, cultural institutions ever devised. A worldwide best seller, translated into twenty-five languages.“I was born in a konak (old house), which once was the harem of a pasha,” writes Alev Lytle Croutier. “People around me often whispered things about harems; my own grandmother and her sister had been brought up in one.”Drawing on a host of firsthand accounts and memoirs, as well ...

Despite its reputation for religious intolerance, the Middle East has long sheltered many distinctive and strange faiths: one regards the Greek prophets as incarnations of God, another reveres Lucifer in the form of a peacock, and yet another believes that their followers are reincarnated beings who have existed in various forms for thousands of years. These religions represent the last vestiges of the magnificent civilizations in ancient history: Persia, Babylon, Egypt in the time of the ...

Ibn Battutah set out in 1325 from his native Tangier on the pilgrimage to Mecca. By the time he returned twenty-nine years later, he had visited most of the known world, travelling three times the distance Marco Polo covered. Spiritual backpacker, social climber, temporary hermit and failed ambassador, he braved brigands, blisters and his own prejudices. The outcome was a monumental travel classic.Captivated by this indefatigable man, award-winning travel writer Tim Mackintosh-Smit...

THE CARPET WARS is foreign correspondent Christopher Kremmer's riveting and timely account of a decade spent living, travelling and reporting from Asia and the Middle East.During his time reporting from Asia and the Middle East he formed an obsession with carpets and the 'perfect rug' - an obsession that saw him trace the threads of the carpet-making trade through the Islamic nations of Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and the former Soviet republics of Central Asia. Along the way ...

Salonica, located in northern Greece, was long a fascinating crossroads metropolis of different religions and ethnicities, where Egyptian merchants, Spanish Jews, Orthodox Greeks, Sufi dervishes, and Albanian brigands all rubbed shoulders. Tensions sometimes flared, but tolerance largely prevailed until the twentieth century when the Greek army marched in, Muslims were forced out, and the Nazis deported and killed the Jews. As the acclaimed historian Mark Mazower follows the city’s inhabit...

From Fouad Ajami, an acclaimed author and chronicler of Arab politics, comes a compelling account of how a generation of Arab intellectuals tried to introduce cultural renewals in their homelands through the forces of modernity and secularism. Ultimately, they came to face disappointment, exile, and, on occasion, death. Brilliantly weaving together the strands of a tumultuous century in Arab political thought, history, and poetry, Ajami takes us from the ruins of Beirut's once glittering m...

While Galileo suffered under house arrest at the hands of Pope Urban VIII, the Thirty Years War ruined Europe, and the Pilgrims struggled to survive in the New World, work began on what would become one of the Seven Wonders of the World: the Taj Mahal. Built by the Moghul emperor Shah Jahan as a memorial to his beloved wife, Mumtaz Mahal, its flawless symmetry and gleaming presence have for centuries dazzled everyone who has seen it, and the story of its creation is a fascinating blend of ...

Mention of Iran may bring to mind images of turbaned Mullahs and nuclear weapons. On the other hand Persia may provoke other images; of Persian Gardens, romantic poetry or the beautiful wives of the last Pahlavi Shah.But this in no way does justice to the people of Iran, or its rich and complex history. For much of the ancient period Iranian empires ruled vast areas from Afghanistan in the East to Egypt in the West. Starting around 600 BCE with the Medes and ending with the modern ...