biography mideast

Hardcover. NY, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1st, 2007, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket, 194 pages. The Jordan Rift Valley, stretching from the Red Sea to Lebanon, was ripped open millions of years ago by vast forces within the earth. This geological object has also been a part of human history ever since early humans used it as a path in their journey out of Africa. And for a quarter of a century it has been part of the biography of Haim Watzman, an Israeli journalist. In the autumn of 2004, as his country was riven by a fierce debate over its borders, Watzman took a two-week journey up the valley. Along the way he met scientists who try to understand the rift through the evidence lying on its surface--an archaeologist who reconstructs the fallen altars of a long-forgotten people, a zoologist whose study of bird societies has produced a theory of why organisms cooperate, and a geologist who thinks that the valley will some day be an ocean. He encountered people whose life and work on the shores of the Dead Sea and Jordan River have led them to dream of paradise and to seek to build Gardens of Eden on earth--a booster for a chemical factory, the director of a tourist site, and an aging socialist farmer who curates a museum of idols. And he discovered that the geography's instability is mirrored in the volatility of the tales that people tell about the Sea of Galilee.

Hardcover. NY, Cambridge University Press, 1st, 2014, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover in pictorial boards, 318 pages. As the architect of the Iranian Revolution of 1979, Ayatollah Khomeini remains one of the most inspirational and enigmatic figures of the twentieth century. The revolution placed Iran at the forefront of Middle East politics and of the Islamic revival. Twenty years after his death, Khomeini is revered as a spiritual and political figurehead in Iran and in large swathes of the Islamic world, while in the West he is remembered by many as a dictator and as the instigator of Islamist confrontation. Arshin Adib-Moghaddam brings together both distinguished and emerging scholars in this comprehensive volume, which covers all aspects of Khomeini's life and critically examines Khomeini the politician, the philosopher, and the spiritual leader. The book details Khomeini's early years in exile from Iran, the revolution itself, and events that took place thereafter including the hostage crisis and the Iran-Iraq war. Lastly, the book considers his legacy in Iran - where Khomeini's image has been used by both reformist and conservative politicians to develop their own agendas - and further afield in other parts of the Islamic world and in the West. Written by scholars from varying disciplinary backgrounds, the book will prove invaluable to students and general readers interested in the life and times of Khomeini and the politics of Islam that he inspired.

Softcover. London, IB Tauris, reprint, 2000, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 418 pages. Ali Shariati is, for many, the ideological father of the Iranian revolution. A charismatic leader and teacher, his radical blend of Islam and Marxism mobilized a whole generation of young Iranians. This full-length political biography looks at Ali Shariati's life and thought in the context of the complex and contradictory cultural, social and political conditions of the Iranian society that shaped him. Clean copy.

Softcover. London, IB Tauris, 1st pbk, 2000, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 314 pages, color and b&w illustrations. In this first biography of Alexander Griboyedov in English, Laurence Kelly paints a vivid picture of a man of remarkable literary talent and diplomatic gifts that were nevertheless overshadowed by ill-fortune. Involved in the 1825 Decembrist plot to overthrow the Tsarist state and the mission to further Russia's expansionist agenda in the Caucasus, the famous writer was eventually murdered by zealous mobs in Tehran. This book makes an invaluable contribution to the diplomatic history of Russia, the Caucasus and Iran at the same time illuminating the life and works of a writer who was among nineteenth-century Russia's most respected and prominent writers. Clean copy.

London, Thames & Hudson, 1st, 1976, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket. INSCRIBED BY AUTHOR on the front fly leaf. 126 pages: 98 black and white illustrations and maps. Synopsis: A richly illustrated account of the historical background to, and life of T. E .Lawrence. Clean copy.

Hardcover. London, Thames and Hudson, 1st, 2015, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 144 pages, Color photos by Ara Guller. Sinan was the greatest architect of the Ottoman Golden Age of the sixteenth century when the Ottoman Empire reached its zenith of power and magnificence. His style marks the apogee of Turkish art. Under Sleyman the Magnificent and his succcessor Selmi II, Sinan designed hundreds of buildings: mosques, palaces, tombs, mausolea, hospitals, schools, caravanserai, bridges, aqueducts and baths, many of them presented and analysed in this book. In his greatest works, he adapted Byzantine and Islamic styles to produce something quite new: a centralized organization of absolute space unhindered by pillars or columns and covered by a soaring dome. An architect of genius in a dynamic new empire expanding into both Asia and Europe, he was a true man of the Renaissance. Clean, bright copy.