Middle East

Jeremy Kroeker is a Mennonite with a motorcycle. He doesn’t have a funny beard, and he’s never even driven a buggy, but his family hails from the same Mennonite community that Miriam Toews fictionalized in A Complicated Kindness....

A shimmering evocation, by turns intimate and panoramic, of one of the world’s great cities, by its foremost writer. Orhan Pamuk was born in Istanbul and still lives in the family apartment building where his mother first held him in her arms....

The author uses themes such as culture, art, religion, women and daily life, to reflect on those same topics as encountered during the author's past 30 years of travel in Turkey....

Declan Walsh is one of the New York Times's most distinguished international correspondents. His portrait of Pakistan over a tumultuous decade captures the sweep of this strange, wondrous, and benighted country through the dramatic lives of nine fascinating individuals....

In Heirs to Forgotten Kingdoms, former diplomat Gerard Russell ventures to the distant, nearly impassable regions where these mysterious religions still cling to survival....

Amid the many and varied tragedies of the Middle East, the loss of a simple pleasure such as the ability to roam the countryside at will may seem a minor matter. But in Palestinian Walks, Raja Shehadeh’s elegy for his lost footpaths becomes a heartbreaking metaphor....

Anthropologist John McManus lifts a lid on the hidden worlds of its gilded princes, manual labourers and domestic workers, its teachers and policemen, culture vultures and thrill seekers....

In March 2022, Michael Palin travelled the length of the River Tigris through Iraq to get a sense of what life is like in a region of the world that once formed the cradle of civilisation, but that in recent times has witnessed turmoil and appalling bloodshed....

Robert Byron set off from Venice with friend Christopher Sykes to explore the architecture of the Middle East. They travel by any means necessary and encounter several setbacks, but their risks are rewarded as they encounter some of the greatest examples of Eastern art and architecture....

A guide to the Arabic dialect of Syria, including a set of introductory words and phrases that can be put to daily use. Topics include numbers, questions, places, greetings, foods, places, and many other topics....