Lawrence and the Arabs

T. E. Lawrence began his lifelong affair with the Middle East as a student at Oxford, taking a fourmonth walking tour of Syria to study the Crusaders castles. He later returned to the area as an archaeologist and was attached to British Army Intelligence in Egypt at the outbreak of World War I. In 1916, he set out on his greatest adventure: with no backing, Lawrence joined Arab forces facing almost insurmountable odds in a rebellion against Turkish domination. His brilliance as a desertwar strategist made him a hero among the Arabs and a legend throughout the world, earning him the moniker Lawrence of Arabia. But his nearpathological dislike of publicity led him to a life of selfimposed obscurity as T. E. Shaw, anonymous RAF soldier. This is the official biography of a unique leader of men whose largerthanlife presence still echoes.