From the Holy Mountain [Paperback]

William Dalrymple (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 5, 1998

The third book from the most gifted young travel writer at work today, author of the best-selling In Xanadu ('one of the best travel books produced in the last twenty years' -- Scotland on Sunday) and City of Djinns ('the best travel book I have ever read' -- George Mackay Brown). In the spring of 587 AD, two monks set off on an extraordinary journey that would take them in an arc across the entire Byzantine world, from the shores of the Bosphorus to the sand dunes of Egypt. On the way John Moschos and his pupil Sophronius the Sophist stayed in caves, monasteries and remote hermitages, collecting the wisdom of the stylites and the desert fathers before their world shattered under the great eruption of Islam. More than a thousand years later, using Moschos's writings as his guide, William Dalrymple set off to retrace their footsteps. Despite centuries of isolation, a surprising number of the monasteries and churches visited by the two monks still survive today, surrounded by often hostile populations. Dalrymple's pilgrimage took him through a bloody civil war in eastern Turkey, the ruins of Beirut, the vicious tensions of the West Bank and a fundamentalist uprising in southern Egypt. His book is an elegy to the slowly dying civilisation of Eastern Christianity and the peoples that have kept its flame alive. It is a rich and gripping blend of history and spirituality, adventure and politics, laced with a thread of black comedy familiar to readers of Dalrymple's previous work.

Editorial Reviews

Review

'Compulsively readable' John Julius Norwich, Observer; 'Everything a really good travel book should be: witty, learned and also very funny' Eric Newby

About the Author

William Dalrymple was born in Scotland. His first book, In Xanadu, won the Yorkshire Post Best First Work Award and the Scottish Arts Council Spring Book Award, and was shortlisted for the John Llewelyn Rhys Prize. His second, City of Djinns, won the Thomas Cook Travel Book Award and the Sunday Times Young British Writer of the Year Award. He was recently elected the youngest Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, and is currently writing a six-part television series on the buildings of the Raj for Channel 4.

Product Details

• Paperback: 512 pages
• Publisher: Flamingo (May 5, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0006547745
• ISBN-13: 978-0006547747
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5.1 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #330,829 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great reading, July 16, 2003

By 

az1963 (Bryn Mawr, PA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: From the Holy Mountain (Paperback)

A very well written book, with beautifully weaved historical, geographical and politicals elements related to a long list of monasteries from Athos, Greece to Southestearn Turkey/Syria all the way to Egypt. Highly readable! The relatively obscure history of Byzantium is unfolded in a very interested viewpoint.
I was mostly impressed by the sharp analysis of the influences of neighboring religions/civilization on the evolution of christianity in the geographic area of Turkey/Syria/Iraq/Persia.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great travelogue, sometimes weak on facts, March 14, 2006

By 

Gerard Lynch "paddingtonw2bear" (Belfast, Northern Ireland) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: From the Holy Mountain (Paperback)

This book is depressing, consicence-alerting, yet great fun at the same time. Travelling from Mount Athos, via Istanbul to Turkish Kurdistan, then to Syria, Lebanon, Israel/Palestine and finally Egypt, Dalrymple surveys the condition of Near Eastern Christianity on the verge of the third Christian millennium. For the most part, this is a depressing story of a community in terminal decline, facing pressure from extremists and economic chaos. While there is no doubt that his sympathies lie with the Christians, he can be deeply critical of them where he feels it is deserved - for example there is no doubt that the holds the Maronites of Lebanon almost entirely responsible for the Lebanese Civil War.

As a travelogue, it generally makes good reading, with an excellent balance between keeping the pace moving and covering people and places in enough depth. His ability to conjure images of places is remarkable - really feel like I'm on the plains of the Tür Abdin, or winding down the mountain road from Damascus to Beirut with him. Sometimes, it has to be said, he lays on the 'gee-whiz I'm an Englishman abroad in scary countries with bombs and tanks and things' attitude a bit too much. While he occasionally has a factual lapse or three, he more than makes up for it in atmosphere.

Perhaps the most interesting and amusing sections deal with the various wacky heretical Christian sects which inhabited the shatterzone between the Greek and Persian worlds before the arrival of Islam.

This book annoyed a lot of extreme American fundamentalists (of both the Christian and the Jewish varieties) for being rather critical of Israel's decades-long campaign of cultural and economic pressure on the Palestinian Christians. What better recommendation to buy the book to you need!

One minor gripe, I never do trust fellow Celts who think of themselves as merely North- or West-Britons. Dalrymple regards English football hooligans rampaging through Istanbul as his 'fellow countrymen' stuck me as bizarre. Are you really a Scot, William?

And I have one big question if Dalrymple ever reads this... he seems not to speak a word of Turkish or Kurdish yet he seems to have these interesting conversations with Kurdish builders about the Armenians... Are all these guys fluent in English or something? 'Coz that's a part of the world I know very well, and in my experience, they don't English any more than your average Dunfermline brickie speaks Kurdish. If you can really do that without the lingo, William, could you give me a masterclass in sign language?

It also seems to fair to point out that the situation for Christians in some parts of the Middle East, notably Turkey and Egypt, has improved considerably in the 10 years since this book was researched.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Complex, fascinating, eye-opening, April 26, 2005

By 

Denise M. Galloway (Holland, MI USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: From the Holy Mountain (Paperback)

Did you know that the Middle East is home to Christians---a lot of them? Before reading this book, it never clicked for me that the ancient traditions of Christianity are alive in communities throughout the land where they began. Author William Dalrymple recreates the journey of John Moschos, a saint from the 500's, beginning in Greece and traveling through Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, and Egypt. He discovers how much the Middle East has changed since the days of the Christian Byzantine Empire, and how much it has stayed the same. He discusses art, politics, history, and theology, discovering connections between eastern and western Christian traditions and the continuity of the Christian faith no matter what the culture. This is an eye-opening look at not only the politics of the Middle East but also the existence of Middle Eastern, ancient Christian churches.