- Essential reading for anyone interested in the Middle East today.
- The perfect antidote to prejudice, ignorance and racial injustice.

The level of noise about the Arab world has been steadily rising. In the pastfifteen years outsiders have twice sent armies to war in the Middle East-to liberate Kuwait from Saddam and then to overthrow him in Iraq. Chronic strife has also afflicted Algeria, Sudan, Lebanon and, by extension, Syria. Palestinians and Israelis have seen long periods of violence. The disaster of 9/11 has precipitated "The War on Terror" and scarcely an Arab country...

Arabic calligraphy is at once an expression of piety, aesthetic sensibility and artistic discipline. Muhaqqaq was an early term which captured care, clarity and meticulousness in calligraphy. It was associated with the making of manuscripts of the Qur'an -- a sacred task and one which helped to give the new Islamic order both identity and coherence. Muhaqqaq energed in the eleventh century as the name for one of six classical scripts. This is the first book devoted entirely to Muhaqqaq tradition.

Nassar Mansour, himself a highly respected calligrapher, here traces the development of...