[escenic_image id="55156060"]In markets like Khan El-Khalili in the old city of Cairo, or indeed in any other Arab souk, the shops, courtyards and the very clothing of the traders and their customers…

[escenic_image id="55144538"] Faith and Power: Religion and Politics in the Middle East Bernard Lewis Oxford University Press 2010 £10.49 Bernard Lewis, Professor of Near Eastern Studies at…

[escenic_image id="55145238"]Consider the map: an object created to represent some aspect of the physical world, purporting to be objective but naturally reflecting the perspective of the mapmaker…

[escenic_image id="55132106"] An Iraq of Its Regions: Cornerstones of a Federal Democracy?  Reidar Visser and Gareth Stansfield C Hurst & Co Publishers Ltd 2007 Stansfield and Visser’s…

[escenic_image id="55129184"] Despite its reputation as a world-class destination for culture, Beirut’s art scene has been hindered by sociopolitical factors since the mid 1970s—as the onset of the…

[escenic_image id="55112119"] Far Horizons Frank Gardner £18.99 Hard Cover Reading Gardner’s book on a summer’s afternoon in London transported me to exotic destinations far from the capital’s…

[escenic_image id="55111049"]Dariush Borbor is an architect, urban planner and researcher based in Tehran. Educated in the United Kingdom and Switzerland, he has made significant architectural…

[escenic_image id="55101553"]Marjane Satrapi has been publishing graphic novels since the beginning of the new millennium. But it wasn’t until the 2007 Cannes Film Festival that the Paris-based…

[escenic_image id="55100877"] In Jail with Nazim Hikmet Orhan Kemal Saqi Books 2010 £10.99 “Your master’s coming.” “No,” Orhan said, “I don’t have a master—or anyone of the kind.” “Look at…

[escenic_image id="5595939"] Over the past five years the world has begun looking to the Middle East for contemporary art. The considerable rise in official arts funding and the competitive building…