Roundabout of Death

Faysal Khartash

Translator Max Weiss

Summary

“A remarkable book, a vivid testimonial to the horrors of the Syrian civil war.”—Robert F. Worth, author of A Rage for Order: The Middle East in Turmoil 
Set in Aleppo in 2012, when everyday life was metronomically punctuated by steady bombing, Roundabout of Death offers powerful witness to the violence that obliterated the ancient city's rich layers of history, its neighborhoods and its medieval and Ottoman architectural landmarks. The novel is told from the perspective of an ordinary man, a schoolteacher of Arabic for whom even daily errands become a life-threatening task. He experiences firsthand the wide-scale destruction wrought upon the monumental Syrian metropolis as it became the stage for a vicious struggle between warring powers. Death hovers ever closer while the teacher roams Aleppo’s streets and byways, minutely observing the perils of urban life in an uncanny twist on Baudelaire's flâneur. Navigating roadblocks and dodging sniper bullets on visits to his mother and sister in the rebel-held eastern sector of the city, the teacher clings to normality with a daily ritual of coffee with friends, where conversation is casually permeated by news of the latest blasts and demise. The novel, a literary edifice erected as an unflinching response to the painful erasure of the physical remnants of a once great city, speaks eloquently of the fragmentation of human existence, the oppressive rule of ISIS militants in nearby Raqqa, the calamities of war and its grinding emotional toll.

Available since: 05/18/2021.

Other books that might interest you

Sharp - The Women Who Made an...

Michelle Dean

A “deeply researched and uncommonly engrossing” book profiling ten trailblazing literary women, including Dorothy Parker and Joan Didion (Paris Review). 
 
In Sharp, Michelle Dean explores the lives of ten women of vastly different backgrounds and points of view who all made a significant contribution to the cultural and intellectual history of America. These women—Dorothy Parker, Rebecca West, Hannah Arendt, Mary McCarthy, Susan Sontag, Pauline Kael, Joan Didion, Nora Ephron, Renata Adler, and Janet Malcolm—are united by what Dean calls “sharpness,” the ability to cut to the quick with precision of thought and wit. 
 
Sharp is a vibrant depiction of the intellectual beau monde of twentieth-century New York, where gossip-filled parties gave out to literary slugging-matches in the pages of the Partisan Review or the New York Review of Books. It is also a passionate portrayal of how these women asserted themselves through their writing despite the extreme condescension of the male-dominated cultural establishment. 
 
Mixing biography, literary criticism, and cultural history, Sharp is a celebration of this group of extraordinary women, an engaging introduction to their works, and a testament to how anyone who feels powerless can claim the mantle of writer, and, perhaps, change the world.

Show book

Conversations with Isaiah Berlin

Ramin Jahanbegloo

An illuminating and witty dialogue with one of the greatest intellectual figures of the twentieth century. Ramin Jahanbegloo's interview with Isaiah Berlin grew into a series of five conversations which offer an intimate view of Berlin and his ideas. They include discussions on pluralism and liberty as well as the thinkers and writers who influenced Berlin. This revised edition provided an excellent introduction to Berlin's thought. Ramin Jahanbegloo is an Iranian philosopher, who has taught in Europe and North America. In 2006 he was imprisoned for several months in Iran. He is currently teaching Political Philosophy at Toronto University. 'Though like Our Lord and Socrates he does not publish much, he thinks and says a great deal and has had an enormous influence on our times'. Maurice Bowra 'Berlin never talks down to the interviewer. Conversations here means the minds of the interviewed and interviewer meet on equal terms in language that is transparently clear, informed, witty and entertaining'. Stephen Spender 'He is wise without seeming pompous, witty without seeming trivial, affectionate without seeming sentimental'. Michael Ignatieff 'Isaiah Berlin... has for fifty years in this talkative and quarrelsome city (Oxford) been something special, admired by all and disliked by no-one... a benevolent super-don'. John Bayley http://berlin.wolf.ox.ac.uk/

Show book