The novel that set the stage for his modern classic, The Satanic Verses, Shame is Salman Rushdie’s phantasmagoric epic of an unnamed country that is “not quite Pakistan.” In this dazzling tale of an ongoing duel between the families of two men–one a celebrated wager of war, the other a debauched lover of pleasure–Rushdie brilliantly portr...more
The daring fragmented structure of this epistolary novel mirrors the chaos surrounding the heroine, Asmahan, as she futilely writes letters to her loved ones, to her friends, to Beirut, and to the war itself--letters of lament that are never to be answered except with their own resounding echoes. Hanan al-Shaykh evokes a Beirut that has been seen b...more
Intended for students as well as scholars of religion and violence, Belief and Bloodshed: Religion and Violence across Time and Tradition discusses how the relationship between religion and violence is not unique to a post-9/11 world-- it has existed throughout all of recorded history and culture.
It would seem unlikely that one could discover tolerant religious attitudes in Spain, Portugal, and the New World colonies during the era of the Inquisition, when enforcement of Catholic orthodoxy was widespread and brutal. Yet this groundbreaking book does exactly that. Drawing on an enormous body of historical evidence—including records of th...more
The author has combed the works of contemporary Arab chronicles of the Crusades, eyewitnesses and often participants. He retells their story and offers insights into the historical forces that shape Arab and Islamic consciousness today.
The struggles in the Levant after World War II are brought painfully to life in this delicate, compassionate novel. Ossyane, a young Lebanese of both aristocratic Ottoman and humble Armenian origins, goes to Montpellier, France, to study away from the burden of his liberal father's revolutionary ambitions. World War II breaks out and Ossyane is ...more
This comprehensive work provides a penetrating analysis of modern Middle Eastern history, from the Ottoman and Egyptian reforms, through the challenge of Western imperialism, to the Iranian Revolution and the Gulf War. After introducing the reader to the region's history from the origins of Islam in the seventh century, Cleveland focuses on the pas...more
Few states in the modern world have had a less promising birth than Jordan. When in 1921 the Hashemite Emir Abdallah was recognized as the ruler of this romantic backwater of the former Ottoman Empire, it was sparsely populated, extremely poor, and widely regarded as ungovernable. Today against all the odds, Jordan has become one of the most prospe...more
The first literary work of one of the most influential philosophers and novelists of the twentieth century-available for the first time in trade paperback. Ayn Rand wrote of her first novel, We the Living, "It is as near to an autobiography as I will ever write. The plot is invented, the background is not...The specific events of Kira's life were n...more
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