The Lost Archive

Download or read book The Lost Archive written by Marina Rustow and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2020-01-14 with total page 620 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A compelling look at the Fatimid caliphate's robust culture of documentation The lost archive of the Fatimid caliphate (909–1171) survived in an unexpected place: the storage room, or geniza, of a synagogue in Cairo, recycled as scrap paper and deposited there by medieval Jews. Marina Rustow tells the story of this extraordinary find, inviting us to reconsider the longstanding but mistaken consensus that before 1500 the dynasties of the Islamic Middle East produced few documents, and preserved even fewer. Beginning with government documents before the Fatimids and paper’s westward spread across Asia, Rustow reveals a millennial tradition of state record keeping whose very continuities suggest the strength of Middle Eastern institutions, not their weakness. Tracing the complex routes by which Arabic documents made their way from Fatimid palace officials to Jewish scribes, the book provides a rare window onto a robust culture of documentation and archiving not only comparable to that of medieval Europe, but, in many cases, surpassing it. Above all, Rustow argues that the problem of archives in the medieval Middle East lies not with the region’s administrative culture, but with our failure to understand preindustrial documentary ecology. Illustrated with stunning examples from the Cairo Geniza, this compelling book advances our understanding of documents as physical artifacts, showing how the records of the Fatimid caliphate, once recovered, deciphered, and studied, can help change our thinking about the medieval Islamicate world and about premodern polities more broadly.

Download or read book Lost Children Archive written by Valeria Luiselli and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2020-02-04 with total page 406 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NEW YORK TIMES 10 BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR • “An epic road trip [that also] captures the unruly intimacies of marriage and parenthood ... This is a novel that daylights our common humanity, and challenges us to reconcile our differences.” —The Washington Post One of The Atlantic’s Great American Novels of the Past 100 Years In Valeria Luiselli’s fiercely imaginative follow-up to the American Book Award-winning Tell Me How It Ends, an artist couple set out with their two children on a road trip from New York to Arizona in the heat of summer. As the family travels west, the bonds between them begin to fray: a fracture is growing between the parents, one the children can almost feel beneath their feet. Through ephemera such as songs, maps and a Polaroid camera, the children try to make sense of both their family’s crisis and the larger one engulfing the news: the stories of thousands of kids trying to cross the southwestern border into the United States but getting detained—or lost in the desert along the way. A breath-taking feat of literary virtuosity, Lost Children Archive is timely, compassionate, subtly hilarious, and formally inventive—a powerful, urgent story about what it is to be human in an inhuman world.

Download or read book The Lost Archive written by Marina Rustow and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2020-01-14 with total page 620 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A compelling look at the Fatimid caliphate's robust culture of documentation The lost archive of the Fatimid caliphate (909–1171) survived in an unexpected place: the storage room, or geniza, of a synagogue in Cairo, recycled as scrap paper and deposited there by medieval Jews. Marina Rustow tells the story of this extraordinary find, inviting us to reconsider the longstanding but mistaken consensus that before 1500 the dynasties of the Islamic Middle East produced few documents, and preserved even fewer. Beginning with government documents before the Fatimids and paper’s westward spread across Asia, Rustow reveals a millennial tradition of state record keeping whose very continuities suggest the strength of Middle Eastern institutions, not their weakness. Tracing the complex routes by which Arabic documents made their way from Fatimid palace officials to Jewish scribes, the book provides a rare window onto a robust culture of documentation and archiving not only comparable to that of medieval Europe, but, in many cases, surpassing it. Above all, Rustow argues that the problem of archives in the medieval Middle East lies not with the region’s administrative culture, but with our failure to understand preindustrial documentary ecology. Illustrated with stunning examples from the Cairo Geniza, this compelling book advances our understanding of documents as physical artifacts, showing how the records of the Fatimid caliphate, once recovered, deciphered, and studied, can help change our thinking about the medieval Islamicate world and about premodern polities more broadly.

Download or read book Raiders of the Lost Archives written by Michael Dahl and published by Stone Arch Books. This book was released on 2020-08 with total page 41 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Deep within the Library of Doom, thieves capture one of the Silent Ones and order him to guide them to the Lost Archives, but he refuses to betray the Librarian and his secrets.

Download or read book The Archive of the Forgotten written by A. J. Hackwith and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2020-10-06 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the second installment of this richly imagined fantasy adventure series, a new threat from within the Library could destroy those who depend upon it the most. The Library of the Unwritten in Hell was saved from total devastation, but hundreds of potential books were destroyed. Former librarian Claire and Brevity the muse feel the loss of those stories, and are trying to adjust to their new roles within the Arcane Wing and Library, respectively. But when the remains of those books begin to leak a strange ink, Claire realizes that the Library has kept secrets from Hell--and from its own librarians. Claire and Brevity are immediately at odds in their approach to the ink, and the potential power that it represents has not gone unnoticed. When a representative from the Muses Corps arrives at the Library to advise Brevity, the angel Rami and the erstwhile Hero hunt for answers in other realms. The true nature of the ink could fundamentally alter the afterlife for good or ill, but it entirely depends on who is left to hold the pen.

Download or read book Apocalypse Now written by and published by National Geographic Books. This book was released on 2021-10-05 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hired in 1976 by Francis Ford Coppola as the still photographer for his masterpiece Apocalypse Now, Chas Gerretsen’s private archive of hundreds of photographs propels readers immediately into the chaos and drama surrounding one of the most important movies ever made. Gerretsen was a renowned freelance photographer working in Vietnam when he got the call from Coppola, who was looking for a combat photographer for a war movie. Given unprecedented access to the film’s stars, extras, crew, and legendary behind-the-scenes drama he spent six months in the Philippines, shooting thousands of images. Culled from that archive, these full-color photographs offer an intimate glimpse of the turmoil and excitement of a Hollywood spectacle rising out of the unpredictable climate of the Philippine rainforest. Capturing the star power of Marlon Brando, Martin Sheen, and Dennis Hopper, as well as the sprawling sets, he takes us into the beauty of the Southeast Asian jungle and shows us how its inhabitants were incorporated into the filming. Throughout the book, Gerretsen’s astute reflections of his experience on set are as fascinating as his photography. While Apocalypse Now remains one of the most critically acclaimed movies of all time, the making of the film is equally legendary. Nearly fifty years later, Gerretsen’s photographs remind us of Coppola’s artistic achievements and of a pivotal era in American cultural history.

Download or read book REBUILDING A LOST FAITH BY AN AMERICAN AGNOSTIC written by JOHN L. STODDARD and published by . This book was released on 1826 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: