Books like 'Our Oriental Heritage'
Readers who enjoyed Our Oriental Heritage by Will Durant also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
historical 20th century africa northern-africa egypt ancient-civilization classics religion politics war
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Claudius the God and His Wife Messalina by Robert Graves
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsWith the same brilliance that characterized his classic I, Claudius, Robert Graves continues the tumultuous life of the Roman who became emperor in spite of himself and his handicaps. Claudius the God reveals the splendor, vitality and decadence of the Roman Empire through the eyes of the wry and bemused Claudius who reigns as emperor for thirteen years... -
![Freedom or Death by Nikos Kazantzakis]()
Freedom or Death by Nikos Kazantzakis
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsFreedom or Death by Nikos Kazantzakis is a novel on the heroic or epic scale about the rebellion of the Greek Christians against the Turks on the island of Crete, where Kazantzakis was from... -
![The Open Door by Latifa Zayyat, لطيفة الزيات]()
The Open Door by Latifa Zayyat, لطيفة الزيات
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThe Open Door is a landmark of women's writing in Arabic. Published in 1960, it was very bold for its time in exploring a middle-class Egyptian girl's coming of sexual and political age, in the context of the Egyptian nationalist movement preceding the 1952 revolution... -
![Mountolive by Lawrence Durrell]()
Mountolive by Lawrence Durrell
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsMountolive is a novel of vertiginous disclosures, in which the betrayer and the betrayed share secret alliances and an adulterous marriage turns out to be a vehicle for the explosive passions of the modern Middle East... -
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![The Egyptian by Mika Waltari, Lynda S. Robinson]()
The Egyptian by Mika Waltari, Lynda S. Robinson
Rated: 4.12 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsThis epic tale encompasses the whole of the then-known world, from Babylon to Crete, from Thebes to Jerusalem, while centering around one unforgettable figure: Sinuhe, a man of mysterious origins who rises from the depths of degradation to become personal physician to Pharaoh Akhnaton...Categorized as:
africa ancient-civilization classics egypt northern-africa religion war 20th-century -
![The Sands of Ammon by Valerio Massimo Manfredi]()
The Sands of Ammon by Valerio Massimo Manfredi
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 18 ratings. THE BESTSELLING EPIC OF THE GLORY AND THE GRANDEUR INTRIGUES AND PASSIONS OF ANCIENT GREECE...AND THE WARRIOR KING WHOSE CONQUESTS BUILT AN ETERNAL LEGEND. ALEXANDER "Volume II: " THE SANDS OF AMMONA thousand years after Agamemnon fought the Trojan War. Alexander, the king of Macedonia and descendant of Achilles, follows in the footsteps of Greek legend...Categorized as:
africa ancient-civilization egypt northern-africa war 20th-century action-adventure adult -
![Helen in Egypt by H.D.]()
Helen in Egypt by H.D.
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsThe fabulous beauty of Helen of Troy is legendary. But some say that Helen was never in Troy, that she had been conveyed by Zeus to Egypt, and that Greeks and Trojans alike fought for an illusion. A fifty-line fragment by the poet Stesichorus of Sicily (c. 640-555 B.C.), what survives of his Pallinode, tells us almost all we know of this other Helen, and from it H. D. wove her book-length poem... -
![Sinuhé, el egipcio I by Mika Waltari]()
Sinuhé, el egipcio I by Mika Waltari
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsTranslated by Naomi...Categorized as:
africa northern-africa egypt classics religion ancient-civilization historical-fiction fiction -
![Stories of New Cairo by Naguib Mahfouz]()
Stories of New Cairo by Naguib Mahfouz
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsIn Naguib Mahfouz's suspenseful novel a bitter and ambitious nihilist, a beautiful and impoverished student, and a corrupt official engage in a doomed ménage à trois.Cairo of the 1930s is a place of vast social and economic inequities... -
![The Mirage by Naguib Mahfouz]()
The Mirage by Naguib Mahfouz
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsA stunning example of Nobel Prize-winning Egyptian author Naguib Mahfouz’s psychological portraiture, The Mirage is the story of an intense young man who has been so dominated by his mother that her death sets him dangerously adrift in a world he cannot manage alone.Kamil Ru’ba is a tortured soul who hopes that writing the story of his life will help him gain control of it... -
![Funeral Games by Mary Renault]()
Funeral Games by Mary Renault
Rated: 4.02 of 5 stars · 27 ratingsAs Funeral Games opens, Alexander the Great lies dying. Around his body gather the generals, the provincial satraps and the royal wives, already competing for the prizes of power and land. Only Bagoas, the Persian boy mourning in the shadows, wants nothing...Categorized as:
africa ancient-civilization classics egypt northern-africa politics war 20th-century -
![The Call of the Curlew by طه حسين, Taha Hussein]()
The Call of the Curlew by طه حسين, Taha Hussein
Rated: 3.94 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsA unique work of fiction in modern Arabic literature. It is a romantic story about the triumph of love over revenge. It describes the social taboos of the time and how one girl eventually overcomes them. Highly poetic style with deep insight into the human heart... -
![Diary of a Country Prosecutor by Tawfiq Al-Hakim, Tawfik Al-Hakim]()
Diary of a Country Prosecutor by Tawfiq Al-Hakim, Tawfik Al-Hakim
Rated: 3.90 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsWho shot Kamar al-Dawla Alwan? Was it a crime of passion? What was the role of the beautiful peasant girl Rim? Is the mysterious Sheikh Asfur as crazy as he seems?Diary of a Country Prosecutor is an Egyptian comedy of errors. Partly autobiographical, it is written as the journal of a young public prosecutor posted to a village in rural Egypt... -
![The Eternal Temple by Christian Jacq]()
The Eternal Temple by Christian Jacq
Rated: 3.89 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe splendor and danger of ancient Egypt continues in the second volume of this magnificent saga. For Ramses, the Son of Light, the coronation has arrived. Now he will learn whether the friends of his youth--people such as Moses and the aging Greek poet, Homer--can truly be trusted...Categorized as:
africa ancient-civilization egypt northern-africa politics religion 20th-century action-adventure -
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![Return of the Spirit by Tawfiq Al-Hakim, توفيق الحكيم]()
Return of the Spirit by Tawfiq Al-Hakim, توفيق الحكيم
Rated: 3.89 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe celebrated, revolutionary novel from a pioneering Egyptian writer Tawfiq al-Hakim, now for the first time in Penguin Classics with a foreword by Egyptian writer Alaa Al-AswanyFirst published in Arabic in 1933, Egyptian playwright and novelist Tawfiq Al-Hakim's Return of the Spirit follows a patriotic young Egyptian and his extended family as they grapple with the events leading up to the... -
![The Train Was on Time by Heinrich Böll]()
The Train Was on Time by Heinrich Böll
Rated: 3.88 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsHeinrich Böll's taut and haunting first novel tells the story of twenty-four-year-old Private Andreas as he journeys on a troop train across the German countryside to the battle on the Eastern front. Trapped, he knows that Hitler has already lost the war ... yet he is suddenly galvanised by the thought that he is on the way to his death... -
![Ramses: The Son of Light by Christian Jacq]()
Ramses: The Son of Light by Christian Jacq
Rated: 3.85 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsHistorical fiction meets mythology as ancient Egypt comes alive in this monumental epic with over 2 million copies sold around the world.At fourteen, Ramses, the second son of the Pharaoh Seth, must begin to pass a series of royal tests designed to build his mental and physical prowess-or break him...Categorized as:
africa ancient-civilization egypt northern-africa politics religion 20th-century action-adventure -
![Mr. Britling Sees it Through by H.G. Wells]()
Mr. Britling Sees it Through by H.G. Wells
Rated: 3.67 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsH.G. Wells' attempt to make sense of World War I. It begins with a lighthearted account of an American visiting England for the first time, but the outbreak of war changes everything. Day by day and month by month, Wells chronicles the unfolding events and public reaction as witnessed by the inhabitants of one house in rural Essex... -
![Akhenaten: Dweller in Truth by Naguib Mahfouz]()
Akhenaten: Dweller in Truth by Naguib Mahfouz
Rated: 3.75 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsFrom the winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature and author of the Cairo trilogy, comes Akhenaten, a fascinating work of fiction about the most infamous pharaoh of ancient Egypt...Categorized as:
africa ancient-civilization classics egypt northern-africa religion 20th-century adult -
![Khufu's Wisdom by Naguib Mahfouz, Naguib Mahfouz]()
Khufu's Wisdom by Naguib Mahfouz, Naguib Mahfouz
Rated: 3.75 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsAt the center of Khufu’s Wisdom, Nobel laureate Naguib Mahfouz’s majestic first novel, is the legendary Fourth Dynasty monarch Khufu (Cheops), for whom the Great Pyramid of Giza was built. When a seer prophesies the end of Khufu’s dynasty and the ascension to the throne of Djedefra, son of the High Priest of Ra, the pharaoh must battle to preserve his legacy against the will of the Fates...Categorized as:
africa ancient-civilization classics egypt northern-africa 20th-century adult anthologies -
![Karnak Cafe: A Modern Arabic Novel by Naguib Mahfouz, Naguib Mahfouz]()
Karnak Cafe: A Modern Arabic Novel by Naguib Mahfouz, Naguib Mahfouz
Rated: 3.67 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsAt a Cairo cafe, a cross-section of Egyptian society, young and old, rich and poor, are drawn together by the quality of its coffee and the allure of its owner, legendary former dancer Qurunfula. When three of the young patrons disappear for prolonged periods, the older customers display varying reactions to the news... -
![Dreamers of the Day by Mary Doria Russell]()
Dreamers of the Day by Mary Doria Russell
Rated: 3.61 of 5 stars · 18 ratings""I suppose I ought to warn you at the outset that my present circumstances are puzzling, even to me. Nevertheless, I am sure of this much: My little story has become your history. You won't really understand your times until you understand mine."" So begins the account of Agnes Shanklin, the charmingly diffident narrator of Dreamers of the Day... -
![Scorpion God by William Golding, Pincher Martin]()
Scorpion God by William Golding, Pincher Martin
Rated: 3.35 of 5 stars · 11 ratingsThree short novels show Golding at his subtle, ironic, mysterious best. The Scorpion God depicts a challenge to primal authority as the god-ruler of an ancient civilization lingers near death. Clonk Clonk is a graphic account of a crippled youth's triumph over his tormentors in a primitive matriarchal society... -
![آن روزها by Taha Hussein, طه حسين]()
آن روزها by Taha Hussein, طه حسين
Rated: 3.58 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsIn memory of the big Egyptian author Taha Hussayn, El Ahram published in one book the three parts of his autobiography "El Ayyam", it's been 100 years since Dr. Taha Hussayn was born when this book was published in 1992... -
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![Why Are We in Vietnam? by Norman Mailer]()
Why Are We in Vietnam? by Norman Mailer
Rated: 3.30 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsWhen Why Are We in Vietnam? was published in 1967, almost twenty years after The Naked and the Dead, the critical response was ecstatic. The novel fully confirmed Mailer's stature as one of the most important figures in contemporary American literature. Now, a new edition of this exceptional work serves as further affirmation of its timeless quality.Narrated by Ranald ("D.J...Categorized as:
war politics classics fiction historical-fiction bildungsroman historical 20th-century -
![Ancient Evenings by Norman Mailer]()
Ancient Evenings by Norman Mailer
Rated: 3.43 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsCrossing three millennia to Pharaonic Egypt, this tale returns to that land's essences - the war, magic, gods, death and reincarnations, the lusts, ambitions, jealousies, and betrayals... -
![India After Gandhi: The History of the World's Largest Democracy by Ramachandra Guha, Edakochi Salimkumar]()
India After Gandhi: The History of the World's Largest Democracy by Ramachandra Guha, Edakochi Salimkumar
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsA magisterial account of the pains, the struggles, the humiliations, and the glories of the world's largest and least likely democracy, Ramachandra Guha's India After Gandhi is a breathtaking chronicle of the brutal conflicts that have rocked a giant nation and the extraordinary factors that have held it together... -
![Master of the Senate by Robert A. Caro]()
Master of the Senate by Robert A. Caro
Rated: 4.35 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsThe most riveting political biography of our time, Robert A. Caro’s life of Lyndon B. Johnson, continues. Master of the Senate takes Johnson’s story through one of its most remarkable periods: his twelve years, from 1949 through 1960, in the United States Senate... -
![The Second World War by Winston S. Churchill, John Keegan]()
The Second World War by Winston S. Churchill, John Keegan
Rated: 4.43 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsThe definitive, Nobel Prize–winning history of World War II, universally acknowledged as a magnificent historical reconstruction and an enduring work of literature From Britain's darkest and finest hour to the great alliance and ultimate victory, the Second World War remains the most pivotal event of the twentieth century... -
![Caesar and Christ by Will Durant]()
Caesar and Christ by Will Durant
Rated: 4.43 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsVolume 3 of the monumental Story of Civilization, CAESAR AND CHRIST depicts the rise of Rome from a crossroads town to empire. The world's first republic, Rome spread its civilization over the Mediterranean and western European world. Its long, slow crumbling and final collapse plunged Europe into darkness and chaos.The Pax Romana broke some heads...Categorized as:
ancient-civilization classics religion 20th-century audiobook christian historical non-fiction
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