Quick hits: Four books that are worth a look
From Saturday's Globe and Mail
Published
Last updated
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EGYPT ON THE BRINK: From Nasser to Mubarak
By Tarek Osman, Yale University Press, 282 pages, $21
It remains to be seen whether the protests that erupted in Egypt this week, inspired by the so-far successful revolt in Tunisia, will unseat the long-standing authoritarian regime of Hosni Mubarak. But to understand the thrust and the context of the current uprising, one might turn to Tarek Osman, an Egyptian who is both a writer and managing director of a private equity firm that invests in the Middle East. Osman tracks the transformation of a country from the religious pluralism for which it was once known – not to mention its spectacular ancient cultural heritage – over the past 60 years or so. He looks at how, since Nasser seized power in 1954, Egypt has been instrumental in the rise of two significant developments: Arab nationalism and Islamic fundamentalism. He also examines the relations between Muslims and Coptic Christians (now at a boiling point), and the rift between the educated urban elite and the shoeless and unemployed rural millions in this powder keg of a country.
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LANDFALLS: On the Edge of Islam with Ibn Battutah
By Tim Mackintosh-Smith, John Murray, 370 pages, $34.99
Tim Mackintosh-Smith is a British writer who has resided in Yemen for the past quarter century. He has written a travel trilogy – of which this is the final volume – in which he retraces the footsteps of Ibn Battutah, the medieval Muslim explorer who has often been compared to Marco Polo, but who travelled approximately three times the distance Polo journeyed. In this final instalment, the intrepid author finds himself in landfalls such as Zanzibar, Granada, the Maldives, Sri Lanka, Mauritania and the coast of China. Mackintosh-Smith’s writings are not all serious erudition and prose, but also suffused with gentle and ribald humour. In an era of tightened borders, he is a humanist teasing out the shared humanity that binds us together. In this exquisitely written volume, Mackintosh-Smith establishes himself as a pre-eminent travel writer of his generation, comparable to an earlier D.H. Lawrence or Eric Newby.
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THE FILM THAT CHANGED MY LIFE: 30 Directors on Their Epiphanies in the Dark
By Robert K. Elder, Chicago Review Press, 295 pages, $18.95
With the Oscar nominees settled, it’s a good time to go back to some older films. And what better guides than the 30 stellar directors who recount – in interviews with journalist Robert K. Elder – the films that forever changed their dreams and their aspirations. Some picks will seem entirely in keeping with the director’s work, such as Guy Maddin opting for Luis Bunuel’s surrealistic L’âge d’or or fellow Canadian Atom Egoyan choosing Ingmar Bergman’s haunting Persona, which “marries a pure form and a very profound vision with absolute conviction.” But there are plenty of surprises. Zombie-meister (and Toronto resident) George Romero loves the balletic form in Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s Tales of Hoffman, while Slumdog Millionaire’s Danny Boyle was gobsmacked by Francis Ford Coppola’s Vietnam epic Apocalypse Now, finding it great and awful at once. Both delight and instruction are to be had here.
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SOMETHING OLD, SOMETHING NEW: For Better or for Worse 1st Treasury
By Lynn Johnston, Andrews McMeel, 404 pages, $27.99
Ontarian Lynn Johnston is the most successful cartoonist Canada has ever produced, what with 200 million readers of For Better or for Worse in more than 2,000 newspapers (are there still that many?) in 23 countries and a stack of honours, including becoming the first woman, and the first Canadian, to win a Reuben Award as Cartoonist of the Year, in 1985. A few years back, she was on the brink of retirement, but reconsidered – with a twist. She began using former plotlines as jumping-off points for new ones. This collection thus features stories from Johnston’s three previous collections and then adds new cartoons as well as weekend colour strips, with many personal annotations by the artist. Fans will love this plunge into the old-new world and the domestic adventures of John and Elly and their children, Michael and Elizabeth.
