Selected articles
‘Arabs: A 3,000 Year History of Peoples, Tribes and Empires’ by Tim Mackintosh-Smith
I have read dozens of narrative histories of the Arabs but I have never felt so transported, so entertained and so immersed.
The Pale Abyssinian: A Life of James Bruce, African Explorer and Adventurer by Miles Bredin
"The Pale Abyssinian" leaves the moral character of James Bruce in tatters. He has however brought the ruddy, oversexed, 6 foot 4 inch Scotsman, vibrantly to life.
Oxford Literary Festival
March 31, 2025
Oxford Martin School: Lecture Theatre
Travel writer and historian Barnaby Rogerson looks back at the reasons for the 1,400-year divide between Sunni and Shia and how it has shaped and continues to shape the Middle East.
Jaipur Literature Festival 2025
January 31 and February 1, 2025
Cheriton Talks
February 22, 2025
St Michael’s Church, Cheriton in Hampshire
The Sherborne Travel Writing Festival 2025
April 12, 2025
The Houthi are Highlanders
Until a few months ago, the Houthi were an obscure footnote to the complex history of the Arabian peninsular, but now due to their habit of firing rockets at ships using the Red Sea … they are very much at the centre of everyone’s attention.
Reading Out Loud
I still cherish my memories when the thrill of the story was in fantastic contrast to the close, protective warmth of the person reading to you
Pilgrims to the Mountain
The carvings of gods and heroes that King Antiochus had commissioned to adorn this mountain have now been weathered by two thousand years of winter snow and the fierce heat of summer.
Review of “A Line in the Sand: Britain, France and the Struggle that Shaped The Middle East”, by James Barr
Baalbek, in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley, is the most magnificent temple in the entire Middle East, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.
Possessed by Peake
I was familiar with the thick lips of the heroine Fuchsia and the cadaverous, high-brow of the anti-hero Steerpike years before I read so much as a line.
Into the West: an island off an island off an island
The sea water moans as if some vast submarine monster lies chained to the sea floor and has been struggling for a thousand years to break free.
Dervla Murphy (1931-2022)
Whatever the theologians might say about heaven being in a state of union with God, I knew that it consisted of an infinite library; and eternity was simply what enabled one to read uninterruptedly for ever
With Don McCullin to the Frontier
it was like winning the prize in a travel competition, the chance to work alongside Britain’s most celebrated war-journalist and photographer, who had himself travelled with many of my literary heroes – such as Norman Lewis and Bruce Chatwin.
Gobekli-Tepe: The Oldest Temple on Earth?
So what was Gobekli-tepe? The stones have already been linked with aliens, refugees from the drowned island of Atlantis, Noah's flood, the lost paradise of Eden and more plausibly as places of astronomical observation.
“Lords of the Atlas: The Rise and Fall of the House of Glaoua” by Gavin Maxwell
Beware. 'Lords of the Atlas' can instill a desparate craving for Morocco and the red-walled city of Marrakech.
“In the Empire of Genghis Khan: A Journey Among Nomads” by Stanley Stewart
I now think everyone should travel with Stanley Stewart across Asia. He is funny, clever but above all, he is believable.
“Writing off the Beaten Track: Reflections on the Meaning of Travel and Culture in the Middle East” by Judith Caesar
She is also sincere, disarmingly honest, decent, interested in a continuous process of revealing self-examination and focusing her observations on the small community with which she has become intimate.
“Travels in Arabia Deserta” by Charles Doughty
Doughty's curious archaic English will always succeed in repelling the casual reader from his book of Arabian travels.
“A Corkscrew is Most Useful: The Travellers of Empire” by Nicholas Murray
Nicholas Murray's book is also good on bringing to life those travellers whose pride, racism and heavy prose make their own books unreadable today.