Saturday, August 21, 2021

SOLD Historical fiction by a Saudi dissident

 



SOLD
Rare book. Very good condition. PB. 640pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

"Banned in several Middle Eastern countries, this novel records the encounter between Americans and Arabs in an unnamed Gulf emirate in the 1930s. As oil exploration begins, the destruction of an oasis community amounts to "a breaking off, like death, that nothing and no one could ever heal." The promise inherent in the creation of a city divided into Arab and American sectors provides the novel's most striking revelation: here not merely two cultures, but two ages, meet and stand apart. Alternatively amused and bewildered by the Americans and their technological novelties, the Arabs sense in their accommodation to modernity the betrayal of their own traditions. Highly recommended, if only for its cross-cultural insights." Library Journal, L.M. Lewis, Eastern Kentucky Univ., Richmond Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.

"The only serious work of fiction that tries to show the effect of oil, Americans and the local oligarchy on a Gulf country." Edward W. Said

No comments: