The Book of Saladin: A Novel (The Islam Quintet) - Softcover

Ali, Tariq

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1781680035 ISBN 13: 9781781680032

Publisher: Verso Books, 2015

Synopsis

The second novel in Tariq Ali's Islam Quintet is a rich and teeming chronicle set in twelfth-century Cairo, Damascus, and Jerusalem. The Book of Saladin is the fictional memoir of Saladin, the Kurdish liberator of Jerusalem, as dictated to a Jewish scribe, Ibn Yakub. Saladin grants Ibn Yakub permission to talk to his wife and retainers so that he might present a full portrait in the Sultan's memoirs. A series of interconnected stories follows, tales brimming over with warmth, earthy humor and passions in which ideals clash with realities and dreams are confounded by desires. At the heart of the novel is an affecting love affair between the Sultan s favored wife, Jamila, and the beautiful Halina, a later addition to the harem. The novel charts the rise of Saladin as Sultan of Egypt and Syria and follows him as he prepares, in alliance with his Jewish and Christian subjects, to take Jerusalem back from the Crusaders. This is a medieval story, but much of it will be uncannily familiar to those who follow events in contemporary Cairo, Damascus, and Baghdad. Betrayed hopes, disillusioned soldiers and unrealistic alliances form the backdrop to The Book of Saladin.

About this title

Review:

Tariq Ali has been one of our national treasures for almost five decades: revolutionary, writer, broadcaster, film maker, polemicist--fighter in the street (the title of his vivid Sixties memoir)--and general all-round trouble-maker (in the nicest possible sense) he's been them all, and usually at the same time. Since 1990 Ali has also worked in fiction, firstly with Redemption, and now with a planned quartet of historical novels, of which The Book of Saladin is the second. (The first was the award-winning, Shadows of the Pomegranate Tree).

Ali's passion for life, and his humour, are found all over this latest work which is set in the 12th century--with eerily prescient echoes of modern times. It shows us the conflict between Christian and Islamic civilisations set to a humorous, sometimes bawdy, sometimes brutal background where all of life is in flux.

As with his previous novel Ali shows the depth and breadth of his learning and humanity on every page. Like his central character Saladin, or Salah-al-Din (the Kurdish liberator of Jerusalem), Ali has been a fighter of many causes, a maker of alliances, who has made an impact on the world around him; unlike his hero Ali has never been a Sultan, nor a warrior, except a class one, of course. But between them--Ali and his warrior King-- readers can discover much of both history and contemporary life in the melting pot of world religion. --Robin Hunt

Review:

“The Book of Saladin is the second in a quartet of novels by Tariq Ali on the long encounter between Western Christendom and the world of Islam. Grippingly well told, brilliantly paced, remarkably convincing in its historical depiction of a fateful relationship, it is a narrative for our time, haunted by distant events and characters who are closer to us than we had dreamed.” – Edward Said

“Ali overturns demonising stereotypes of Salah-al-Din, portraying instead the ‘barbarian’ Western invaders. Whether depicting erotically charged harem intrigue or siege warfare, The Book of Saladin is an entertaining feat of revisionist storytelling.” – Simon Carnell, Sunday Times

“Episodic, redolent of Middle Eastern epic story cycles, it rearranges the Euro-centric geographical and historical world view ... a story rich with human passion and poetry.” – Guardian

“Ali’s new historical novel ... is told in a manner which combines the incantatory storytelling of the great Middle Eastern anthologies with the solidarity of historical research.” – Philip Hensher, Mail on Sunday

“Fiercely lyrical. Weaving political intrigue, gay and straight love, betrayal, cross-dressing, rape, assassination and crimes of passion, Ali’s tale ripples with implicit parallels to our age.” – Publishers Weekly

About this edition

• Publisher: Verso Books
• Publication date: 2015
• ISBN 10: 1781680035
• ISBN 13: 9781781680032
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 384