Alexandria: A History And A Guide
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: No dust jacket
Pages: Good
Condition remarks: Condition as shown in image
Few cities have captured the imagination of Western writers and historians quite like Alexandria — and few guides to that storied metropolis rival the depth and intimacy of E.M. Forster's Alexandria: A History and a Guide. Written during Forster's wartime stay in Egypt between 1915 and 1919, this remarkable volume is split into two distinct yet complementary halves: a sweeping historical narrative that chronicles Alexandria's founding by Alexander the Great, its golden age as a centre of Hellenistic learning and trade, its turbulent passage through Roman, Arab, and Ottoman rule, and its eventual transformation into the cosmopolitan port city of the modern era — followed by a practical street-by-street guide for the curious traveller. Forster brings to this work the same lucid prose, sympathetic intelligence, and humanist curiosity that distinguish his celebrated novels, yet here he turns those gifts upon a real and layered place, illuminating the city's ancient Library, the philosopher Hypatia, the poet Cavafy — whom Forster championed to the English-speaking world — and the countless civilisations that left their mark upon Alexandria's sun-bleached stones. This edition presents an introduction by Lawrence Durrell, himself one of Alexandria's most famous literary devotees, whose own Alexandria Quartet owes a spiritual debt to Forster's pioneering vision. Together, Forster's text and Durrell's introduction form an essential literary pilgrimage to a city that has always been as much myth as geography — and one that continues to haunt the Western imagination long after the last page is turned.
Author: E M Forster
Format: Paperback
Genre: History
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: No dust jacket
Pages: Good
Condition remarks: Condition as shown in image
Few cities have captured the imagination of Western writers and historians quite like Alexandria — and few guides to that storied metropolis rival the depth and intimacy of E.M. Forster's Alexandria: A History and a Guide. Written during Forster's wartime stay in Egypt between 1915 and 1919, this remarkable volume is split into two distinct yet complementary halves: a sweeping historical narrative that chronicles Alexandria's founding by Alexander the Great, its golden age as a centre of Hellenistic learning and trade, its turbulent passage through Roman, Arab, and Ottoman rule, and its eventual transformation into the cosmopolitan port city of the modern era — followed by a practical street-by-street guide for the curious traveller. Forster brings to this work the same lucid prose, sympathetic intelligence, and humanist curiosity that distinguish his celebrated novels, yet here he turns those gifts upon a real and layered place, illuminating the city's ancient Library, the philosopher Hypatia, the poet Cavafy — whom Forster championed to the English-speaking world — and the countless civilisations that left their mark upon Alexandria's sun-bleached stones. This edition presents an introduction by Lawrence Durrell, himself one of Alexandria's most famous literary devotees, whose own Alexandria Quartet owes a spiritual debt to Forster's pioneering vision. Together, Forster's text and Durrell's introduction form an essential literary pilgrimage to a city that has always been as much myth as geography — and one that continues to haunt the Western imagination long after the last page is turned.