Selected articles
Book review: “Agents of Empire: Knights, Corsairs and Spies in the 16th century Mediterranean World” by Noel Malcolm
... the book’s fine focus is trained on the condition and fate of the nobles, citizens, peasant cultivators and highland clansmen
Book review: “Unreasonable Behaviour” by Don McCullin
… what makes him remarkable is his restless quest for the perfection of his craft continuously sharpened by a vast capacity for work
Book review: “Medina in Birmingham, Najaf in Brent: Inside British Islam” by Innes Bowen
Over 60% of Muslims in Britain come from the lands of the old Raj - Pakistan, India and Bangladesh. So Urdu and English are the languages of communication in British Islam, not modern classical Arabic, let alone Koranic Arabic.
Book review: “Outlandish Knight: The Byzantine Life of Steven Runciman” by Minoo Dinshaw
This biography is both funny and erudite as it chronicles a fascinating caste of dangerously charming spies, poet-scholars, scheming Oxbridge academics, dashing majors and clever queens.
Book review: “Sufism & Surrealism” by Adonis
... for the small readership who can engage in the poetics of two cultures situated in two different ages, it is a work of extraordinary richness.
Book review: “The Marches: Border walks with my father” by Rory Stewart
Today Rory finds the land no longer in the hands of indigenous native farmers, but increasingly divided between factory farms and national parks, the gaps filled in with a spreading suburbia of retirement villages and tourist-friendly infrastructure.
Book review: “The Man Who Created The Middle East: A Story of Empire, Conflict and the Sykes-Picot Agreement” by Christopher Simon Sykes
... he started out as a convinced imperialist but was so disgusted by British rule in India (and French rule in North Africa) that he eventually realized that mere administrative efficiency should never be exchanged for freedom.
Book review: “Footprints in Spain: British lives in a foreign land” by Simon Courtauld
Britain banned the practice of bull baiting in 1835 but, in Spain, the ritualized slaying of a fierce wild animal, timed to punctuate the annual calendar and local festivals, continues to this day.
Book review: "Ariel, a Literary Life of Jan Morris" by Derek Johns
the honesty with which she chronicled her change of sexual identity has made Conundrum arguably her most famous book.
Book review: “Arabs: A 3,000-Year History of Peoples, Tribes and Empires” by Tim Mackintosh-Smith
Mackintosh-Smith is not just immersed in this history, he has been endangered by it. Alongside his fellow citizens of Sanaa, he has witnessed the violence and individual tragedies of three Yemeni civil wars, evidence of which is sadly etched in the book's dedication.
Book review: “The Stopping Places: a journey through Gypsy Britain” by Damian Le Bas
What gives his book its special poignancy is that in order to create this book (to read, research, question, record and write) he has in the process, expelled himself from his tribe.
Book review: “The Land of the White Horse: visions of England” by David Miles
.. the Uffington White Horse has always been both ancient and modern. It is an ephemeral figure which needs the active participation of every generation, to scour it, in order to survive."
Book review: “Review of The Buried” by Peter Hessler and “Only the Dead” by Ted Gorton
Peter Hessler’s The Buried is, however, a masterpiece of contemporary travel writing
Book review: “On Travel and The Journey Through Life”
It also offers practical tips to make the most of your trip, ranging from advice on cleaning a wound to tethering a camel.
Book review: “The Carians - from Seafarers to City Builders”, edited by Olivier C. Henry and Ayse Belgin-Henry
Caria might look just a small province within the national frontiers of Turkey, but under this sort of close attention to detail it expands to become a cultural universe of its own.
Book review: “The Discovery of Albania, travel writing and anthropology in the 19th-century Balkans” by Johann Georg von Hahn
The sight of a beautiful youth awakens astonishment in the lover, and opens the door of his heart to the delight which the contemplation of this loveliness affords.
Memorial address for Alida Harvie
For the beautiful young Alida was warmly embraced by Lloyd George, beamed at by Mr Baldwin, Ramsay Macdonald bestowed a wintry smile, the be-monocled Austern Chamberlain offered a more formal salute and even Mr Winston Churchill gave her a puckish smile.
A brave bitch
A cold shudder struck us both and we raced to the cliff edge walking along it, staring down at the shingle beach about 80 feet down a steeply sloping ridged drop.
Funeral address for Keith Rogerson
Though enchanted by the sea, he was not a natural cog within any system. When they shared a cabin together, Andrew Waugh remembers how my father used to ‘lose’ a portion of his paperwork by posting them into a crack he had opened into the metal bulkhead.
China Tea in Gibraltar
For a skilled submariner could piggy-back his way through any surveillance, by waiting patiently and then tagging its way along by following (a bit like a limpet) underneath a noisy ship.