Arabian Sands (Penguin Classics)

by Wilfred Thesiger (Author), Rory Stewart (Introduction)

• New

  Paperback
  2007

  $13.18

  Wilfred Thesiger was born in Addis Ababa in 1910 and educated at Eton and Oxford. Though British, he was repulsed by the softness and rigidity of Western life, the machines, the calling cards, the meticulously aligned streets, etc. In the spirit of T.E. Lawrence, Thesiger spent five years exploring and wandering the deserts of Arabia. With vivid descriptions and colorful anecdotes he narrates his stories, including two crossings of the Empty Quarter, among peoples who had never seen a European and considered it their duty to kill Christian infidels.

• Used

  Paperback
  2007

  $3.94

  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.

• Used

  Hardcover
  2000

  $32.57

  Wilfred Thesiger charts the time he spent living with the Bedu, including his legendary traverses of the Empty Quarter. Wilfred Thesiger is the last of the great British eccentric explorers, a legendary figure renowned for his travels though some of the most inaccessible places on earth. Arabian Sands was his widely acclaimed first book and is recognized as one of the great travel classics. His evocative prose and stunning photographs capture the spirit of the proud tribespeople who became his friends and the harsh landscape he inhabited with them in a way very few westeners have.