Review: The Arabs: A History

The Arabs: A History by Eugene Rogan
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I'm not entirely sure why I decided to read another survey of Middle East history book so soon after finishing the first one, but I finished it anyway. At least it helped to solidify events in my memory more, considering that while reading this I was starting to realize how much I'd already forgotten from the last book and it's only been two weeks. So yes, reviewing material after you've read it is helpful if you actually want to retain anything. [and the sky is blue.]

As the title suggests, the emphasis in this book is on the history of the Arab peoples, which means that unlike other Middle East history books, Turkey and Iran aren't really covered much (aside from their influence on the Arab nations) because their peoples aren't really Arab themselves, despite having a significant Muslim presence and being so close by. Instead, you get plenty more coverage of the North African Arab nations west of Egypt: Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya, and it was great to be able to fill in the picture from those perspectives. The emphasis here is more on modern history approaching 20th century also, although this time there isn't a book subtitle to make that clear.

The main thing that differentiates this from a standard non-fiction history textbook is that it comes with more vivid descriptions and details of events, often quoted directly from people who experienced them firsthand. It's great to have if you like hearing things firsthand ala documentary style. While it does make it a bit harder to recall the big picture sometimes, there's usually enough context and explanation provided to allow you to discern things at that level. But anyway, the details are the main thing that drew me to this book after finishing the last one; otherwise I don't think I'd have bothered as much.

Basically another solid read if you're looking for an introduction to Middle East history, and probably a bit more accessible than other comparable works. The main concept that Rogan tries to get at is that the Arab peoples have struggled for ages to get to a point of being able to determine their own destiny, and to this day have been largely deprived of that right by both foreign intervention and internal sectarianism. It's a crisis that continues to plague their consciousness today, in the face of a seemingly endless stream of suicide bombings and political assassinations and conflicts and civil wars and so on. This book actually came out before the Arab Spring happened, but from the way it ends off, there's no surprise why it did.

Review: And Then There Were None

And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I think I've been subjected to too many "and then there were none" murder mystery scenarios by this point (...blame Umineko), but this one, the original of them all, still packs quite a punch all these years later. There's no detective, no Poirot or Miss Marple, and for that very reason it works. It still manages to draw you into that atmosphere that I don't really know how to describe well other than being calmly British with a subtly growing sense of paranoia. I don't think that came out right. But needless to say, it's a great choice for audiobooking if you're looking for something to listen to.

(To be honest, part of me isn't entirely sure if the mystery is that solvable, considering that some of the clues revealed after the fact felt more like a stretch to me... but aside from that, I'm pretty satisfied with the ending, considering that I already had part of it spoiled for me a long time ago but still didn't see the final reveal coming anyway.)

Review: The Hunger Games

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Obviously this has been said before, but this book feels really reminiscent of Battle Royale. Apparently Collins had never read or seen that series when she wrote this, which I guess speaks more to how captivating the idea of having a dystopian story about teenagers fighting to the death is (and now that I think about it, there's also Lord of the Flies in that group). I don't think I really felt the full impact that this book would have given otherwise if I hadn't seen Battle Royale before, so I can't really judge how well it would go down for others (I assume great). At least, it's a pretty decent story and makes for a gripping fast read if anything.

The only personal gripe I have is with how the entire story is told solely through Katniss's perspective, which feels rather limiting considering how much else is going on during the Games that ends up only heard about or surmised. It's something that Battle Royale handled better technically, but I guess it's more of a personal preference for me as there are probably other reasons for the book to be told the way it is. Outside of her and Peeta and a couple of others, I found it hard to really feel anything about most of the other characters, including Rue. As the only glimpse of them you get is through Katniss's eyes, they end up seeming more like fodder for her to ponder on or make the plot continue, rather than standing alone as individual characters.

That, and Katniss isn't really the most interesting protagonist/narrator here. Her random emotional outbursts were a little hard to accept, considering that half of the time even she didn't know why she was getting angry and just went along with it. You could argue about it being the product of the stress of the games or whatnot, but it didn't really help her character much other than make her sound more annoying to listen to in those moments.

Overall, not the most novel or best version of this dystopian concept out there, but it's a fairly accessible and well written one at that.

Review: A History of the Modern Middle East

A History of the Modern Middle East by William L. Cleveland
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

A great read for anyone wanting a relatively comprehensive overview of the region, if not lacking a little in the descriptive details. Note that this is a history textbook and so will come across as a bit drier compared to other nonfiction books, but for an introductory classical historical treatment of the Middle East from early Islam to the present day (up to the 2011 Arab Spring in the most recent edition), I'm guessing it won't get much better than this. That said, I hear Gelvin is recommended if you're looking for something more concise and to the point on how to actually approach this subject on the other hand.

The perspective of the narrative here is primarily told from the viewpoints of the governments of the Middle Eastern nations themselves over the Western ones, although there's naturally plenty of coverage of the latter anyway. Egypt, Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, Saudi Arabia, and the Palestinians take the spotlight with occasional digressions to the north African nations and the Gulf States. Emphasis on the modern in that maybe 80% of the book is concerned with developments of the 20th/early 21st century, with the centuries before that point mostly summarized to provide context for everything else.

Given the vast scope of material to be covered in several hundred pages, a lot of events are mentioned in passing only to point out how they fit into the bigger picture, so I found myself wiki-ing a lot of incidents out of curiosity anyway when the details were scarce. As far as the big picture goes, Cleveland (and Bunton who took this up after Cleveland died in 2006) does a good job of pointing out trends and analyzing causes and effects from as wide and as neutral a perspective you can probably get, even regarding the most recent events. The Western perspective is also addressed (there's a whole chapter on America's role in establishing hegemony in the region post-Cold War era), but only insofar as to convey the significant impact that Western views have had on the region, given their frequent tendency to ignore the historical and present context when dealing with it.

Reading this made me appreciate the fact that a lot of the issues that plague the Middle East to this day are fundamentally ingrained in its geopolitical history: from the arbitrary forced formation of nation-states post World War I, to the frequent outsider intervention of Britain, France, the Soviets, and the US, to the unique natural (oil-rich) and political environment of the nation-states themselves, allowing authoritarian governments to prosper and persist at the expense of their people, while hindering the development of any viable movements that might actually be able to replace them and last. Islam is only one part of a bigger picture, and to focus primarily on the religious aspect of things, for good or bad, is to ignore the fact that there are other primary and often material causes involved that would encourage the people of the Middle East to turn to Islamist movements in the first place; many of these causes are problems that have no easy or simple solutions to begin with. It's difficult to expect any government to be able to satisfy the demands of a population that is ideologically at odds with itself or impose reforms via a political system fundamentally designed to discourage such developments.

Oddly enough, as the book points out, there's even an example of a secular state turning more religious (Turkey) and a religious state turning more secular (Iran) within the same timespan, both because of the population growing dissatisfied with the way their regimes were dealing with their issues... and in other words, life is complicated.