Drinking Arak Off an Ayatollah's Beard

Author: Nicholas Jubber
Publisher: ReadHowYouWant.com
ISBN: 1458759857
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 498

Book Description
An engrossing blend of travel writing and history, Drinking Arak off an Ayatollah's Beard traces one man's adventure-filled journey through today's Iran, Afghanistan, and Central Asia, and describes his remarkable attempt to make sense of the present by delving into the past. Setting out to gain insight into the lives of Iranians and Afghans today, Nicholas Jubber is surprised to uncover the legacy of a vibrant pre-Islamic Persian culture that has endured even in times of the most fanatic religious fundamentalism. Everywhere-from underground dance parties to religious shrines to opium dens-he finds powerful and unbreakable connections to a time when both Iran and Afghanistan were part of the same mighty empire, when the flame of Persian culture lit up the world. Whether through his encounters with poets and cab drivers or run-ins with ''pleasure daughters'' and mujahideen, again and again Jubber is drawn back to the eleventh-century Persian epic, the Shahnameh (''Book of Kings''). The poem becomes not only his window into the region's past, but also his link to its tumultuous present, and through it Jubber gains access to an Iran and Afghanistan seldom revealed or depicted: inside-out worlds in which he has tea with a warlord, is taught how to walk like an Afghan, and even discovers, on a night full of bootleg alcohol and dancing, what it means to drink arak off an Ayatollah's beard.

The Slow Road to Tehran

Author: Rebecca Lowe
Publisher: September Publishing
ISBN: 1914613031
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 434

Book Description
SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2023 EDWARD STANFORD TRAVEL WRITING AWARDS TRAVEL BOOK OF THE YEAR One woman, one bike and one richly entertaining, perception-altering journey of discovery. In 2015, as the Syrian War raged and the refugee crisis reached its peak, Rebecca Lowe set off on her bicycle across the Middle East. Driven by a desire to learn more about this troubled region and its relationship with the West, Lowe's 11,000-kilometre journey took her through Europe to Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, Sudan, the Gulf and finally to Iran. It was an odyssey through landscapes and history that captured her heart, but also a deeply challenging cycle across mountains, deserts and repressive police states that nearly defeated her. Plagued by punctures and battling temperatures ranging from -6 to 48C, Lowe was rescued frequently by farmers and refugees, villagers and urbanites alike, and relied almost entirely on the kindness and hospitality of locals to complete this living portrait of the modern Middle East. This is her evocative, deeply researched and often very funny account of her travels - and the people, politics and culture she encountered. 'Terrifically compelling ... bursting with humour, adventure and insight into the rich landscapes and history of the Middle East. Lowe recounts the beauty, kindnesses and complexities of the lands she travels through with an illuminating insight. A wonderful new travel writer.' Sir Ranulph Fiennes

The Case for Islamo-Christian Civilization

Author: Richard W. Bulliet
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231127979
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 199

Book Description
The 'clash of civilisations' so often talked about in connection with relations between the West and Arab nations is, argues Richard Bulliet, no more than dangerous sophistry based on misconceptions in American government. He sets out the common ground between Islam and Christianity.

Khomeinism

Author: Ervand Abrahamian
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520085039
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 208

Book Description
The author argues that the Ayatollah Khomeini and his Islamic movement should be seen as a form of Third World political populism - a radical but pragmatic middle-class movement that strives to enter, rather than reject, the modern age.

The Fairy Tellers

Author: Nicholas Jubber
Publisher: Nicholas Brealey
ISBN: 1529389259
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 336

Book Description
‘A carnival of a book, rigorously researched and jostling with life’ —Amy Jeffs, author of Storyland Who were the Fairy Tellers? In this far-ranging quest, award-winning author Nicholas Jubber unearths the lives of the dreamers who made our most beloved fairy tales: inventors, thieves, rebels and forgotten geniuses who gave us classic tales such as ‘Cinderella’, ‘Hansel and Gretel’, ‘Beauty and the Beast’ and ‘Baba Yaga’. From the Middle Ages to the birth of modern children’s literature, they include a German apothecary’s daughter, a Syrian youth running away from a career in the souk and a Russian dissident embroiled in a plot to kill the tsar. Following these and other unlikely protagonists, we travel from the steaming cities of Italy and the Levant, under the dark branches of the Black Forest, deep into the tundra of Siberia and across the snowy fells of Lapland. In the process, we discover a fresh perspective on some of our most frequently told stories. Filled with adventure, tragedy and real-world magic, this bewitching book uncovers the stranger lives behind the strangest of tales.

Deception

Author: Adrian Levy
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 0802718604
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 628

Book Description
The shocking, three-decade story of A. Q. Khan and Pakistan's nuclear program, and the complicity of the United States in the spread of nuclear weaponry. On December 15, 1975, A. Q. Khan-a young Pakistani scientist working in Holland-stole top-secret blueprints for a revolutionary new process to arm a nuclear bomb. His original intention, and that of his government, was purely patriotic-to provide Pakistan a counter to India's recently unveiled nuclear device. However, as Adrian Levy and Catherine Scott-Clark chillingly relate in their masterful investigation of Khan's career over the past thirty years, over time that limited ambition mushroomed into the world's largest clandestine network engaged in selling nuclear secrets-a mercenary and illicit program managed by the Pakistani military and made possible, in large part, by aid money from the United States, Saudi Arabia, and Libya, and by indiscriminate assistance from China. Based on hundreds of interviews in the United States, Pakistan, India, Israel, Europe, and Southeast Asia, Deception is a masterwork of reportage and dramatic storytelling by two of the world's most resourceful investigative journalists. Urgently important, it should stimulate debate and command a reexamination of our national priorities.

Mirrors of the Unseen

Author: Jason Elliot
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 9780312427337
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 454

Book Description
The bestselling author of "An Unexpected Light" conducts a fascinating journey through the cultural and artistic landscape of Iran, both past and present. 15 halftones. Two 16-page photo inserts.

The Strategic Culture of the Islamic Republic of Iran :.

Author: Michael Eisenstadt
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Iran
Languages : en
Pages : 52

Book Description
"The Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) is an unconventional adversary that requires unconventional approaches to planning, strategy, and policy. These approaches must take into account the country's sophisticated culture, the regime's religious-ideological orientation, the abiding importance of Iranian nationalism, and Iran's modern military history. And they must recognize the IRI's unique approach to statecraft, strategy, and the use of force. Doing so is no easy task for Americans, as the United States and Iran are studies in opposites when it comes to culture, values, and politics ... These factors complicate efforts to understand Tehran's behavior and to formulate effective policies toward the Islamic Republic. Iran's political system, moreover, is unique in that it is characterized by parallel structures that are the locus of multiple power centers. These consist of both traditional state and revolutionary institutions: the President and Supreme Leader; the Majles and Guardian Council; the Judiciary and Special Clerical Courts; and the regular military and the Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC), with the former often counterbalanced, and sometimes undermined by the actions of the latter. This organizational complexity and the importance of informal influence networks also often renders the functioning of the regime opaque -- even to many of its own members -- making it especially difficult for outsiders to understand what is going on. Finally, planners and policymakers dealing with the IRI should keep in mind three generalizations that can be said of a number of countries, but which are especially true for the Islamic Republic: [1] Nothing in Iran is as it seems; things are often to the contrary ... [2] Nothing in Iran is black and white; ambiguity and shades of grey rule ... [3] Iranian politics are characterized by numerous contradictions and paradoxes ... With these caveats in mind, this monograph will attempt to identify the salient features of the IRI's strategic culture, and their implications for planning, strategy, and policy"--Introduction.

Foucault and the Iranian Revolution

Author: Janet Afary
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226007871
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 359

Book Description
In 1978, as the protests against the Shah of Iran reached their zenith, philosopher Michel Foucault was working as a special correspondent for Corriere della Sera and le Nouvel Observateur. During his little-known stint as a journalist, Foucault traveled to Iran, met with leaders like Ayatollah Khomeini, and wrote a series of articles on the revolution. Foucault and the Iranian Revolution is the first book-length analysis of these essays on Iran, the majority of which have never before appeared in English. Accompanying the analysis are annotated translations of the Iran writings in their entirety and the at times blistering responses from such contemporaneous critics as Middle East scholar Maxime Rodinson as well as comments on the revolution by feminist philosopher Simone de Beauvoir. In this important and controversial account, Janet Afary and Kevin B. Anderson illuminate Foucault's support of the Islamist movement. They also show how Foucault's experiences in Iran contributed to a turning point in his thought, influencing his ideas on the Enlightenment, homosexuality, and his search for political spirituality. Foucault and the Iranian Revolution informs current discussion on the divisions that have reemerged among Western intellectuals over the response to radical Islamism after September 11. Foucault's provocative writings are thus essential for understanding the history and the future of the West's relationship with Iran and, more generally, to political Islam. In their examination of these journalistic pieces, Afary and Anderson offer a surprising glimpse into the mind of a celebrated thinker.

The Shah, the Islamic Revolution and the United States

Author: Darioush Bayandor
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319961195
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 440

Book Description
The Islamic Revolution in 1979 transformed Iranian society and reshaped the political landscape of the Middle East. Four decades later, Darioush Bayandor draws upon heretofore untapped archival evidence to reexamine the complex domestic and international dynamics that led to the Revolution. Beginning with the socioeconomic transformation of the 1960s, this book follows the Shah’s rule through the 1970s, tracing the emergence of opposition movements, the Shah’s blunders and miscalculations, the influence of the post-Vietnam zeitgeist and the role of the Carter administration. The Shah, the Islamic Revolution and the United States offers new revelations about how Iran was thrown into chaos and an ailing ruler lost control, with consequences that still reverberate today.