Over the course of several months during 1931 and 1932, Robert Byron journeyed to three countries teetering on the brink of change. In Russia, which was stricken by famine, Stalin's dictatorship was
Egypt’s belle epoque was a period of incredible extravagance during which the Khedive Ismail’s Cairo became the mirror image, both architecturally and socially, of decadent Paris. The glamour and hedo
A goldsmith’s daughter who eludes the Prince of Darkness, three wandering brothers born from a walnut tree, the Princess of Fantasistan, the case of the Shah’s lost ruby ring, the leopard
A century before the emergence of its cousin, the Sicilian Mafia, the criminal organization known as “The Camorra” was establishing a deadly grip on Naples and Campania. Today, their influence is as s
A mixture of travelogue, history and war journalism, Allah's Mountains tells the story of the conflict between this nation of mountain tribes and the might of the Russian army. It is also a story of t
This pioneering book considers the culinary cultures of the Middle East in a variety of contexts. The contributors discuss various aspects of historical and contemporary processes, including likely or
What turned Adolf Hitler, a relatively normal and apparently unexceptional young man, into the very personification of evil? To answer this question, acclaimed historian Brigitte Hamann has turned to
This is the story of two of the most heroic, and controversial, figures in archaeology: Heinrich Schliemann, who discovered the remains of Troy, and Arthur Evans who unearthed the great city of King M
"The paradise of adventurers", Shanghai during World War II was suffused with dangerous glamour. Racketeers, cutthroats and con-men jostled for advantage as secret agents of the great powers waged a c
Scattered in a crescent in the sparkling waters of the Aegean, the islands of the Sporades are known to Greek fishermen as "the gates of the wind." It was to this unspoilt archipelago that Michael Car
It calls for a writer more able at words to picture the sheer beauty of the Mountain. To convey the altering feeling of morning, or high noon; of afternoon, and deep midnight; of the golden scores of
The Arabian Nights: A Companion guides the reader into this celebrated labyrinth of storytelling. It traces the development of the stories from prehistoric India and Pharaonic Egypt to modern times. I
One of the most famous and tortured romances in history—between Elizabeth I, Queen of England, and Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex—began in 1587, when she was 53 and he was 19. Their passionate affair
Though steeped in a rich and ancient past, Calabria had been lost from view when Norman Douglas visited in the early 1900s. Within Douglas’s vibrant account of his adventures is woven the rich
This book is a cultural history of Tangier, something not done before. Tangier is perennially fascinating and experiencing a major renaissance. It's a popular travel destination once again and people
Written just after the Second World War, Perseus in the Wind (named after the constellation) is perhaps the most personal, and haunting, of all Freya Stark's writings. She muses on the seasons, the ef
The magical qualities of stained glass have an enduring appeal, but church windows tend to be ignored as a form of creative and artistic expression. How to Look at Stained Glass is a fresh, unstuffy g
For centuries, the food and culinary delights of the Byzantine empire - centred on Constantinople - have captivated the west, although it appeared that very little information had been passed down to
