Lebanon

William Harris has written an expansive political and institutional history of Lebanon.....Offers a historical context and a set of arguments for considering the past and present of this complex, divided and vulnerable country....The book is well-sourced....The writing is clear and crisp [and] the reader never loses track of the narrative's thread....Harris's account offers much food for thought. * James A. Reilly, Middle East Media and Book Reviews *
This book is a welcome addition to the historiography of the modern Middle East... [A]n impressive achievement....Harris seems as much at home in the medieval and early modern periods as he is in the more modern and contemporary period * Peter Sluglett, Middle East Journal *
This book is a major contribution to the social history of modern Lebanon. * A. J. Abraham, Journal of Third World Studies *
This book will provide scholars with a useful and overdue reference. * T.J. Gorton, Times Literary Supplement *
One of the few recent works in English on the complete history of Lebanon in the Islamic period. Most books have strengths and shortcomings. Harris's study is almost completely free of the latter. An excellent volume. * Juan Romero, Middle Eastern Studies *
The history of Lebanon remains culturally and religiously complex, and with this work, Lebanon: A History, William Harris presents the reader with both a blueprint and a roadmap. Wither well-written prose and clear evidence, the author enables readers to navigate and unlock the labyrinth of Lebanese history -its people and its culture. * Teaching History *
Fifteen hundred years of history is a monumentally long and perilous journey that any historian, gifted and competent as he may be, would be foolhardy to undertake. Yet Harris promises and delivers history in the longue durée, in a gripping seamless narrative, bringing clarity, class, and depth to a story a rare few can tell without disorienting themselves and losing their readers along the way....A meticulous, ambitious, and compelling story of Lebanon. * Franck Salameh, The Levantine Review *
William Harris, a recognized scholar of the Levant, provides a nuanced narrative of this often fractious nation. * Arab Studies Quarterly *
This Herculean effort is the best book about Lebanon to come out in the past half decade. Intense at the beginning, where the author had to grapple with a scarcity of resources and the confusing jumble and black hole of ethnicities in the post-Roman collapse, the book is compact in the second half, which Lebanon became central to Roman attempts to penetrate and hold the Levant. The book is compelling, easily readable, digestible, and understandable. Essential. * CHOICE *
A successful account that provides much of value for those interested not only on Lebanese history but also that of the Middle East. The limitations of Ottoman control and complexities of ethnic and confessional politics emerge clearly. * The Historical Association *
A signal contribution to the study of Lebanon. William Harris savors that country and knows its ways. With this book, he steps forth as one of the very best historians of Lebanon. With no ax to grind, this is history in the finest tradition. * Fouad Ajami, Hoover Institution, Stanford University *
William Harris discovered Lebanon in its darkest hours, and became an intimate. Few are better qualified to write an overview of Lebanese history, as he has done here in this excellent book, the outcome of decades of such intimacy. * Michael Young, author of The Ghosts of Martyrs Square: An Eyewitness Account of Lebanon's Life Struggle *
Lebanon is defined by its religious diversity, its communities long predating the modern state. In this lucid and engaging new history, William Harris traces the evolution of the Christian, Muslim, and Druze communities of Mount Lebanon over fourteen centuries, the better to understand the dangerous sectarian democracy of modern Lebanon. A bold and authoritative analysis based on Arabic and European sources that will guide Western readers through the maze of Lebanese history and politics. * Eugene Rogan, The Middle East Centre, University of Oxford *