Notes on a Century, Bernard Lewis
Notes on a Century, Bernard Lewis
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Notes on a Century
Reflections of a Middle East Historian

Author: Bernard Lewis, Buntzie Ellis Churchill

Narrator: Ralph Lister

Unabridged: 12 hr 58 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 05/10/2012


Synopsis

Few historians end up as historical actors in their own right, but Bernard Lewis has both witnessed and participated in some of the key events of the last century. When we think of the Middle East, we see it in terms that he defined and articulated.In this exceptional memoir he shares stories of his wartime service in London and Cairo, decrypting intercepts for MI6, with sometimes unexpected consequences. After the war, he was the first Western scholar ever invited into the Ottoman archives in Istanbul. He coined the term “clash of civilizations” in the 1950s, when no one imagined that political Islam would one day eclipse communism. A brilliant raconteur with an extraordinary gift for languages (he mastered thirteen), he regales us with tales of memorable encounters with Edward Kennedy, the Shah of Iran, Golda Meir, and Pope John Paul II among many others.September 11 catapulted him onto the world stage as his seminal books What Went Wrong? and Crisis of Islam leaped onto bestseller lists. In his first major book since the second Iraq war, Lewis describes how—contrary to popular fiction—he opposed the war and reveals his exchanges with the Bush administration outlining his far greater concerns about Iran.For more than half a century, Bernard Lewis has taken influential and controversial positions on contemporary politics and on the politics of academe. A man of towering intellect and erudition, he writes with the flair of Toynbee or Gibbon, only he has seen more and is much funnier.

About Bernard Lewis

Bernard Lewis is the Cleveland E. Dodge Professor of Near Eastern Studies Emeritus at Princeton University and the author of many critically acclaimed and bestselling books, including two number one New York Times bestsellers: What Went Wrong? and Crisis of Islam. The Middle East: A Brief History of the Last 2,000 Years was a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist. Internationally recognized as the greatest historian of the Middle East, he has received fifteen honorary doctorates and his books have been translated into more than twenty languages.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Buck on August 21, 2012

Bernard Lewis has acquired more languages than most people have sexual partners. That lead-in was intended as hyperbole, until I did the math and realized it was potentially true in my case, depending on how you count languages (and sexual partners). So now I feel like a slacker in both departments. L......more

Goodreads review by Elif on March 23, 2021

the biggest reason why im a history student now is this book......more

Goodreads review by Elliot on December 29, 2016

Bernard Lewis has the reputation among young scholars and leftists as the arch-Orientalist: the scholar who whispers dangerous things in the ears of power in order to conquer the Muslim East for the Capitalist West. So I thought I’d read the man’s memoirs to see what he had to say for himself. By al......more

Goodreads review by Zafer on June 03, 2024

Okuması oldukça keyifli ve ufuk açıcı. Yılların ve derin bilgi birikiminin süzgecinden geçip damıtılmış çıkarım ve anazlizlere bu şekilde kolayca ulaşabilmenin cazibesi kitabın en önemli yanı benim için.......more