The Middle East: A Brief History of the Last 2, 000 Years [Paperback]

Part of the difficulty in keeping up comes from the way in which Lewis presents his information. This is not your typical linear narrative, starting at a particular era and then ploughing forward through time. Though there is an overall progression (we start out in the Roman era and end up in current times), the author also often backtracks when discussing different aspects of the civilizations he covers. So while the book starts out in a relatively chronological manner in the first few chapters(Romans>Byzantines-Crusades>Mongol Invasions>Turkic Ascendency-Ottomans), we suddenly detour to Part IV of the book, entitled "Cross-Sections." Lewis then proceeds to break down different societal components such as "The State," "The Economy," "The Elites," etc. in which he backtracks to provide additional details about groups he has earlier portrayed. This is where I for one, who am looking for enlightenment on these subjects and have no real background scholastically speaking, had a hard time keeping track. I consider myself at least a moderately attentive reader, and a lover of history from Herodotus to Gibbon to Parkman to Tuchman, but felt swamped at times here from the sheer wealth and breadth of information. One also had better be up on their geography from about six different eras in that part of the world. Though there are a series of maps in the appendix, obscure towns, countries and dynasties are paraded forth at a rate that is taxing for the general reader. While we may be familiar with place-names such as Mecca, Medina or even Basra, how many western readers are going to have a mental image of the area that Yathrib sits in? or Nishapur? or Bukhara? The maps don't really help either, as the regions that have the most obscure towns are in areas that are the most darkly shaded, and the print is so fine, it's impossible to make the names out.

All that said, if you want to learn about a region that up until recently not many westerners were really all that interested in, Lewis is an excellent teacher. Just be warned that he is rather a dry lecturer. He's not a "school of color" historian. He's an academic and a pure scholar. There are vitually no anecdotal details. No human interest. No exciting passages or descriptions of great battles. He is a purveyor of information and you will come away from reading <The Middle East> with a lot more information than you came in with. If, like me, you think being at least reasonably well-informed at times such as these is important, you will want to investigate this book.

The book ends with Bernard Lewis speculating over what the future might hold for the Middle East and the Muslim world now that there is only one superpower left in the world and now that the major European powers have pretty much withdrawn from the region and no longer exert such a "heavy hand." Bernard Lewis's comments and musings are tempered by his historian's natural reticence to comment or opine on the future, but nonetheless I found his insights helpful.

In terms of where Bernard Lewis's book fits in with other books, I think Lewis is unrivaled as an historian of the Middle East and of the Muslim world generally. The book is similar to other books insofar as Lewis provides a history of the Middle East over the last 2,000 years (several thousand books have probably been written on that large subject alone). So, I think it covers the same subject matter, objectively speaking, as other history books. But Lewis gives us insights and ties events together in a way other historians do not. His writing style is also a pleasure compared to the turgid prose of some others in the field.

I ended up having my appetite whetted by Lewis's musings on the future. If other readers feel similarly, they may want to read Anthony J. Dennis's excellent book "The Rise of the Islamic Empire and the Threat to the West." Unlike Lewis, Dennis does not set out to provide an exhaustive and comprehensive history of the Muslim Middle East over the last 2,000 years. Rather, Dennis pulls significant strands and discusses significant or "watershed" developments and events which tend to support his thesis that political Islam functions much like nationalism does in other parts of the world, and furthermore that fundamentalist Islam may very well serve as the basis for the political unification of some or all of the traditional Muslim world (the "birth of an empire", see middle chapters of his book). In essence, Anthony Dennis picks up where Bernard Lewis left off. As someone outside the academy (Dennis holds Middle East history and other degrees but is apparently a practicing lawyer and human rights activist not an academician), Dennis is not afraid to speculate on possible future power shifts in that part of the world. Lewis appears uncomfortable making such predictions or educated estimates. I found Lewis matchless in the historical sphere and Dennis similarly breathtaking in looking ahead in an intelligent and highly creative fashion to possible future developments in the Middle East (particularly within the world of political Islam). Would recommend both books be read in tandem.

If I had to make a criticism I would say I found the middle section a little heavy going… the first third of the book details the origin of society in the Middle East in particular focussing on the origins of races/tribes; the final third of the book describes the role of the Middle East in world affairs over the past 200 years, notably focussing on wars in the 20th century and the discovery of oil (at the very end).

That said it is fairly readable if you are looking at it for more than purely reference purposes, and I certainly find myself understanding the origins of the Middle East far better than I did before.