Desmond Stewart (1924–1981)

While dated (1962), this work is invaluable for its eyewitness assessment of the Arab "archipelago"--the scattered fertile islands through a void of sand and sea. The author has visited, surveyed and photographed his way through most of the countries in the region.

The account of the "visible"--a word Desmond Stewart frequently uses--is not made less valuable by the passage of time, especially when ideological counter-factual narratives continue to be curated by fanatics in the region. The author is fluent in both the classical Arabic language as well as the many dialects. This shared language with 100 million speakers cements the otherwise very different parts of the Arab world.

Stewart also provides a fair description of the historical, political and religious developments of the region, at a time when it is dominated by President Gamal Nasser of Egypt.

The great Arab historian Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406), who spurned "theology" in one of the earliest nonreligious philosophies of history (contained in his masterpiece, the Muqaddimah [“Introduction”] is quoted when speaking of the "great miracle" of uniting the Arabs: "If you had expended all treasures on earth, you would not have achieved unity among them. But God achieved unity among them." [11]

Steward then describes the fact that today, it is easier for a European to move about Europe than for an Arab to travel. There is still no customs union, mail service is delayed, currency and visa regulations are obstacles, and "Nor are Arab countries well-informed about each other." Education is minimal, in all but Lebanon, and few foreigners are allowed in outside of a Hajj to Mecca, and that city is closed to nonbelievers. Slavery is still an institution in Saudi Arabia. Public executions and floggings are the public entertainment.

Still, "the Arabs possess a distinctive common culture". [13a] Poetry in the past was an Arab bond; today, music, and song in particular, takes its place. The reedy music of quarter tones dictates the attitude. Um Kalthum, the Egyptian singer is more truly the "Voice of Arabia" than any commentator or tribal lord. And everywhere, "Salaam aleikum!" To every Arab, "every other Arab is his brother, but not always in an idealistic sense. Brothers, after all, have been known to become enemies."

Stewart describes the onset of Islam as a "Conquering Tolerant Faith" (Chapter 2). The great artof the Arabs before Islam was poetry. Mohammad warned Arabs against the pagan poets, but cast the Koran in rhymes that would convert them. [27] And the descendants of the waves of Semites who had migrated past Syria and Egypt across Mesopotamia and the Mediterranean borderlands. Also mentions the roles of Khadija, Ayesha--who wrote the "traditions" about Mohammed. [Ayesha actually wrote the Koran itself during the rule of Abu Bakr, the First Caliph, her father.] All four of Mohammed's successors were murdered. For a brief period in the Ninth Century science and philosophy flourished in Baghdad. [32] But the Mutazilites were defeated by orthodoxy, and Islam became increasingly rigid, forcing many into mysticism, called Sufis. The chapter concludes: "It is impossible to understand the Arabs without an understanding of this limitation of their history"-- The first four caliphs had been as democratic as Britain's Gladstone, if not America's Jefferson. "In later centuries, Moslem potentates were decorative mollusks ruling a harem behind a shell of barracks." [32] Three generations would reduce a dynasty from vigor to indolence. In 1258 Mongols decimated Baghdad. Ottoman Turks took over. Arabic civilization became a memory.

The modern European conquests are described in a chapter entitled "The Perfidy of Colonialism." By the 1960's "the Arab world was almost entirely decolonized" [48], but it was rough going. The Suez Canal was seized by Nasser in 1956, and nationalists toppled the statue of Ferdinand de Lesseps.

The "Society between Two Poles" is a chapter on the Arab soul which looks outward to the sea ("every Arab is a trader"), and inward to the desert, the Levantine and the Zeolot.[59-60] Where dour pieties and belly-dancing are both "traditional".… (altro)