The Desert and the Sown: The Syrian Adventures of the Female Lawrence of Arabia

Rating:
Summary: Travels in Turkish Syria
Review: Gertrude Bell is probably one of the most interesting women of pre-World War I England. A daughter of privilege and she was educated and curious at a time when women of her class were expected to marry well and have children to police the Empire. Bell broke this mold and was the archetype of the "traveling Englishwoman" of the high British Empire.

Bell is today best remembered for her role in building modern Iraq. But the Desert and the Sown takes place before World War I, and details her adventures in Syria. Bell was not a professional archeologist and you will need to look elsewhere for detailed scholarly studies of the places she traveled. Her usual method was to go off and visit some famous or not so famous ruin, spend a day or two there taking pictures and etching inscriptions, and then moving on.

But this book is a remarkable travelogue of Syria and Palestine before World War I. She details her travels, the problems, the difficulties, who she met and what they talked about. The Turks rightly viewed her with suspicion - a child of the English ruling class, they saw her as an unofficial English agent, making contact with local tribal leaders who could be used against the Turks if war broke out.

The book is a quite remarkable insight into the politics of the near East, and given the current crisis, one that should be read by all looking to figure out where to go next.

My only compaint about the book is not Bell's writing, but rather the edition. The photographs would be better served on glossy paper, and better maps should be provided.


Rating:
Summary: Marvelous Book
Review: Having read a current bio about Gertrude Bell (Desert Queen), which I found a bear to get through due to the less than amazing quality of writing, I was curious about Bell's own writings and thrilled to find some still in print. Gertrude Bell could write!! What a wonderful book. Having an interest in archaeology and the history of ancient civilizations, I enjoyed the material she offered. But even if those aren't areas of interest to you, the people she met and talked to give one a better understanding of the midEast and of people in general. This was a hard book to put down. My only desires were that a map had been provided and that all of her wonderful pictures would have been printed on glossy paper so they could have been better appreciated. (I would have paid the extra!)