Arabian Sands (Penguin Classics) | Wilfred Thesiger | archetypal saga of exploration and adventure

Arabian Sands (Penguin Classics) | Wilfred Thesiger | Thesiger's Arabian Sands

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Arabian Sands (Pen...

	Arabian Sands (Penguin Classics) Wilfred Thesiger Penguin Classics, 2008 - 400 pages average customer review:based on 39 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Arabian Sands is Wilfred Thesiger?s record of his extraordinary journey through the parched ?Empty Quarter? of Arabia. Educated at Eton and Oxford, Thesiger was repulsed by the softness and rigidity of Western life??the machines, the calling cards, the meticulously aligned streets.? In the spirit of T. E. Lawrence, he set out to explore the deserts of Arabia, traveling among peoples who had never seen a European and considered it their duty to kill Christian infidels. His now-classic account is invaluable to understanding the modern Middle East.

archetypal saga of exploration and adventure

Not only a magnificent travelogue chronicling travels in in a harsh, surreal landscape, here we see the age-old yearning of the explorer to discover the things which cannot be found among the comforts and conveniences of civilization,chief of which is a knowledge of what kind of man he will prove to be when tested to his utmost. Though Thesiger never promotes his undertakings as spiritual experiences,it becomes evident that surely they have as much right to be called so as any other avowedly represented accounts. His fascination with the ascetic lives of his Bedu companions with their fierce nobility and many customs of traditional Arab culture shows the desire of a searcher for meaning transcending the materialism of the modern West. It is a tribute to his integrity that, despite his admiration, he also realizes he is bound to his own heritage and could never be truly one of them. His descriptive powers are outstanding,both of people and places. This is the best adventure/travel book I have read to date.

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Thesiger's Arabian Sands

I had heard this was the definitive work on the desert country but never had gotten around to reading it. I now have and it is terrific - every thing it's cracked up to be. I had read Michael Asher's biography; I had been in Ethiopia, Oman and Yemen; I traveled in the Hadhramaut -- all of this over fifty years later but still there is the flavor of Thesiger's days. His writing of crossing the Empty Quarter was a precursor of Asher's more recent writings about desert travels. He writes well and keeps the reader completely caught up with his trek. There is a sadness, on Thesiger's part (and mine), that as progress has affected the Bedu life, the stability of the old days is no more. But for a loving report on life as it used to be with the Bedu tribes, I whole heartedly recommend Arabian Sands. (I should not Rory Stewart's introduction was worth the price of the book)

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The magnificent obsession

The Rub Al Khali, the Empty Quarter, or as the Arabs called it, The Sands, is one of the most inhospitable places on earth, and one of the least populated as a result. Like Mt. Everest, or the South Pole, each of which became the obsession of some men, sometimes costing them their lives, the Empty Quarter became an obsession of Wilfred Thesiger. He was not the first Westerner to cross it, Bertrand Thomas was, in the `30's, and then Harry (Abdullah) St. John Philby after him, but Thesiger is deservedly the most famous, due to this wonderful account that is difficult to put down. His birth and childhood in Abyssinia, in 1910, the son of the first British Ambassador, seems to have marked him for the "path less traveled." To fully appreciate "Arabian Sands,' it helps to have read "The Life of My Choice," his autobiography.

The first part of "Arabian Sands" covers his youth in Africa, and his initial desert trips in Dhaufar, and in the Danakil country. The end of the book involves his travels in then "forbidden" Oman. The heart of his story though, is his two epic crossing of The Sands. Unlike other Westerner explorers, he was unsupported in his efforts, by other Westerners, save for the financial support of the British Anti-Locust Board. He had to live by his wits, establishing firm and trusting relationships with his beloved Bedouin (Bedu) who were the essential element in his success. In so doing, he developed an understanding of the conditions of their very harsh life, and enthusiastically emulated them. In addition to coming to terms with the "ship of the desert," the camel, and adapting to the rhythms of desert travel with such transport, he also had to stay one step ahead of central authorities, and deal with the tribal politics, which invariably meant that some tribes would be hostile to both him, and his traveling companions solely for tribal reasons. Furthermore, since he was not a Muslim, he had to deal with those individuals and tribes who were hostile due solely to his non-adherence to their religion and beliefs, but Thesiger was wise enough to realize that much of the hostility resulted from the fact that all the other Westerners who were exploring were looking for oil, and the natives feared a loss of their land - it was hard for them, or even most Westerners to understand his motives of doing it solely "because it was there." After his second crossing he was arrested in the town of Sulaiyil by adherents of the Ikhwan, the fundamentalist brotherhood that very well may have made an "example" of him, "to encourage the others", and executed him. It was only the direct intervention of his friend, Philby, with the Saudi king, Abdul Aziz, which secured his release.

The book contains numerous excellent maps, which outline his trips, as well as the tribal areas. It also includes some excellent black and white photographs, many of them of his traveling companions. On a personal note, he inspired a passion to visit Yabrin, on the northern edge of the Empty Quarter, and I was able to see it develop into a significant town, over a 23 year period, a far cry from the absolute absence of people at this oasis when he passed through in 1948.

I couldn't give the book a 5-star however. As one other reviewer indicated, it would help if we looked a bit at the man himself, and his reference frame. The book was written around 12 years after the events, and he admits to not maintaining accurate notes, so how much was changed in his memory? Certainly he experienced "comradeship," like men do in war, but does that mean we should have wars for this experience? It seemed that he unduly romanticized the hardship, and bemoaned that the bedu would loose their remarkable way of life with the coming impact of the modern world. And there is no question that there are only a few real bedu left on the Arabian peninsula, as they have enthusiastically embraced the conveniences of the modern world in the subsequent 60 years. It should be noted that Thesiger carefully picked the timings of his travels, to do so only in the winter. If he had spent a couple of summers with the bedu, I strongly suspect that much of his romanticism would have evaporated, and the hum of an air-conditioner would be much appreciated. Also, there may have been more than an aversion to the modern material world behind his passion for the remote areas of yore - throughout his life, including his days in Kenya at the end, there was always a youthful companion with him.

Setting aside these caveats, and realizing that the prism may be distorted, his achievements are remarkable, and we are fortunate to have an enthralling narrative of this vanished way of life.

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Outstanding Chronicle of Exploring the Empty Quarter

After you read this, you'll never think the same of the "Empty Quarter" which encompasses much of the south of the Arabian Peninsula. First of all, you'll find it's not so empty, with the nomadic Bedu plying the dunes and oases of the region as they have for centuries. In fact, this story is primarily about the Bedu who are incredibly tough but also incredibly principled. Their moral code could teach us a lot. Their love for their camels, who literally enable them to live in their hostile geography, and for their fellow man is humbling. The author, an intrepid explorer of these desert sands, does an outstanding job of bringing the Bedu culture to us. If you want to more fully understand the nomadic Arab mind, you could do much worse than to read this outstanding book.

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Thesiger was thirsty for water and I was thirsty for plot!

I live most of the year in Saudi Arabia and saw this book at a local bookstore. I was attracted by the cover, reviews, inside photography, and the author's opening comments. I purchased it hoping I would get a greater understanding of the world I live in before the influence of Western luxuries/conveniences. I also thought it would be an enjoyable true-life adventure story.

Thesiger was drawn to the bedu setting from of his disdain for the onslaught of technological progression which has been infiltrating every corner of the earth. And no doubt, I benefited from the book with learning more about the bedu culture/mentality as well as their relationship with each other and other Arabs and the degree of attention that they gave to Islam (or "cultural" Islam, not to be confused with Islam as it truly is). But make no mistake, those fascinating points are very SPARSELY scattered throughout the text.

Since the book contained rich descriptions and I did learn a few interesting things from it, it would be unfair of me to give only 1 or 2 stars. But why didn't I give it 4 or 5 stars? Of 287 pages, it seemed that nearly all of it consisted of traveling in the sands, occasionally visiting a town to get permission from a Shaykh to travel therein, and then OCCASIONALLY noting interesting observations from his traveling companions. That's what it was, from beginning to end. There was little to no plot, just the author's love for basking in asceticism. However, even THAT is lacking because there is very little personal reflection of life from the author in the midst of his surroundings. We don't have a page where he looks up into the sky and ponders the creation of the universe or anything of that nature. Quite simply, the book is a narrative of dealing with camels, searching for water, and getting dinner invitations. A few times throughout the book he mentioned some important historical points about Islamic history (it's spread and how it propelled Muslims to be the most advanced civilization of their time) and he concludes that this is because of the bedu participation/influence--yet even these observations, if brought together, could not cover a single page. Although the journey was a true-life "adventure" -- there was danger from thirst, lack of food-source, etc -- and sometimes it seemed that the author, as a Christian, would be in a tough bind, yet none of those scenarios ever greatly escalated, which of course is good for the author(!) but boring for the reader.

For those of you who do choose to purchase/read Arabian Sands, my advice is simple: find a cozy spot where you can read it without any distractions or any impending time engagements. If you don't, the pleasant writing style will slip by unappreciated and your enjoyment will be even less.

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8

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