Lawrence's Vision for Arabia
Nov 17th 2007, 10:53 am
#16
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Re: Lawrence's Vision for Arabia
Interesting this topic came up just now... I've found myself wanting to learn more about the C20 history of this region... I wikipedia'd TEL before i came out here and I saw the O'Toole film ages ago. all i can remember is the scene in open desert where he's waiting for Faisal and Omar Sharif appears slowly on a horse out of nowhere. Brilliant cinema. Would re-watcihng the film be a good place to start? I've put Thiesiger on my amazon wish list for chrimbo too 
Nov 19th 2007, 4:28 pm
#17
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Re: Lawrence's Vision for Arabia
I think most critics agree that the Seven Pillars is only semi-autobiographical; it does decend into tall tales of derring-do, and his thinking is Orientalist in that he romanticises the Arabs as "Noble Savages":
'Really this country, for the foreigner, is too glorious for words: one is really the baron in the feudal system.'
You can deconstruct his sexual penchants to the nth degree - childhood beatings from his mother, the fact that he was the bastard son of his knighted father & the governess, the Jesuit schooling; but the fact remains that despite having more flaws than a SZR apartment block the guy performed some extraordinary acts, and in his thinking aspired to an evolved personal morality.
'Really this country, for the foreigner, is too glorious for words: one is really the baron in the feudal system.'
You can deconstruct his sexual penchants to the nth degree - childhood beatings from his mother, the fact that he was the bastard son of his knighted father & the governess, the Jesuit schooling; but the fact remains that despite having more flaws than a SZR apartment block the guy performed some extraordinary acts, and in his thinking aspired to an evolved personal morality.
Yes,SYR-said quasi fictional.His Mom wasn't quite a Governess-well not in the classroom!-she was a Maid.Concur, an enigma
Love your posts.Please write some more-but change back into your lovely titfer first.
Nov 19th 2007, 4:40 pm
#18
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Re: Lawrence's Vision for Arabia
Interesting this topic came up just now... I've found myself wanting to learn more about the C20 history of this region... I wikipedia'd TEL before i came out here and I saw the O'Toole film ages ago. all i can remember is the scene in open desert where he's waiting for Faisal and Omar Sharif appears slowly on a horse out of nowhere. Brilliant cinema. Would re-watcihng the film be a good place to start? I've put Thiesiger on my amazon wish list for chrimbo too
JVR, You must ask Santa for all Wilf's Books-including Maitalnd's Bio-you will not be disappointed.As for watching Lean's L. O . A.......- just watch it for the Object D'Art that it is-same as Ryan's Daughter etc etc....
Nov 19th 2007, 4:49 pm
#19
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Re: Lawrence's Vision for Arabia
Thiesiger's books are really readable, definitely get them in your stocking! Funnily enough I got chatting with an amazing old gent called Noor Al Rashid a few weeks back - he has been the court photographer here since 1958 and he pulled out a pocketbook of old photographs that he'd taken of Thiesiger, Sheikh Zayed, Sheikh Rashid, Sheikh Mohammed when he was a little kid. It made me realise how short the timeline really is back to the "protectorate" days...
Oh I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall there-you are so lucky SYB....
Yes, doesn't all just seem a nanosecond away?
Wilf was a funny old b***h at times ...Oedipul and vengeful but kept the 'audience' on his side.One of my fav books as a child was 'Ring of Brightwater '.Then when I read, in Maitland, that Maxwell and Wilf had terrible spats-all those years of love for 'Tarka' went out the window in favour of Wilf!!!
Opine some more pse SYB....
Nov 20th 2007, 6:10 am
#20
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Joined: Jun 2007
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Posts: 40
Re: Lawrence's Vision for Arabia
Hi
Read the book and have followed some of historical routes through Saudi & Jordan, had some great camp outs following the Hajj railway from Mecca, the railway station at Medina Saleh was renovated by ancient monuments of the UK, much of the stone work replaced by stone masons from Fort George near Inverness, Medina Saleh was built by the Nabatean people prior to Petra, I believe they built Petra due to the caravan trail for spices etc., moving to the costal region away from inland, followed the trail into Jordon, Wadie Rum, visited the cleft in the rock where the two foot prints are carved overhead, plenty water and cool inside just as Lawrence wrote in the book.
I am not a historian or anything like it! Just a bored Jock who spent 8 years working in Saudi, based in Yanbu, also mentioned in the book, the house he stayed at is now just a shell, shame as its part of the Saudi history, we sailed at the sharm where the British Destroyer almost ran aground also in the book, have loads of pictures, all in storage in the UK. All this took place in the early nineties before the troubles.
I even found Lawrence's house in London, its marked above the doorway, found it wondering about when my wife was running the London marathon, so that was the end of my quest, still got some relics from the railway and Ottoman forts that guarded the railway.
Aye found memories
B.
Read the book and have followed some of historical routes through Saudi & Jordan, had some great camp outs following the Hajj railway from Mecca, the railway station at Medina Saleh was renovated by ancient monuments of the UK, much of the stone work replaced by stone masons from Fort George near Inverness, Medina Saleh was built by the Nabatean people prior to Petra, I believe they built Petra due to the caravan trail for spices etc., moving to the costal region away from inland, followed the trail into Jordon, Wadie Rum, visited the cleft in the rock where the two foot prints are carved overhead, plenty water and cool inside just as Lawrence wrote in the book.
I am not a historian or anything like it! Just a bored Jock who spent 8 years working in Saudi, based in Yanbu, also mentioned in the book, the house he stayed at is now just a shell, shame as its part of the Saudi history, we sailed at the sharm where the British Destroyer almost ran aground also in the book, have loads of pictures, all in storage in the UK. All this took place in the early nineties before the troubles.
I even found Lawrence's house in London, its marked above the doorway, found it wondering about when my wife was running the London marathon, so that was the end of my quest, still got some relics from the railway and Ottoman forts that guarded the railway.
Aye found memories
B.
Nov 20th 2007, 6:20 am
#21
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Re: Lawrence's Vision for Arabia
Wasn't Lawrence of Arabia supposed to be a poofter?
Nov 20th 2007, 6:27 am
#23
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Nov 20th 2007, 7:20 am
#25
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Re: Lawrence's Vision for Arabia
Who said i was going back to the UK? Merely leaving Dubai for greener pastures. I am presently considering an opportunity in Abu Dhabi but fortunately (for you and your friends) my wife is not keen.
Nov 20th 2007, 7:34 am
#26
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Re: Lawrence's Vision for Arabia
Nov 20th 2007, 7:43 am
#27
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Re: Lawrence's Vision for Arabia
Oh I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall there-you are so lucky SYB....
Yes, doesn't all just seem a nanosecond away?
Wilf was a funny old b***h at times ...Oedipul and vengeful but kept the 'audience' on his side.One of my fav books as a child was 'Ring of Brightwater '.Then when I read, in Maitland, that Maxwell and Wilf had terrible spats-all those years of love for 'Tarka' went out the window in favour of Wilf!!!
Opine some more pse SYB....
Yes, doesn't all just seem a nanosecond away?
Wilf was a funny old b***h at times ...Oedipul and vengeful but kept the 'audience' on his side.One of my fav books as a child was 'Ring of Brightwater '.Then when I read, in Maitland, that Maxwell and Wilf had terrible spats-all those years of love for 'Tarka' went out the window in favour of Wilf!!!
Opine some more pse SYB....
For anyone interested in Arab history, I can recommend Albert Hourami's History of the Arab People as a thoroughly non-Orientalist account.
Nov 21st 2007, 9:05 pm
#28
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Joined: Aug 2007
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Re: Lawrence's Vision for Arabia
Hi
Read the book and have followed some of historical routes through Saudi & Jordan, had some great camp outs following the Hajj railway from Mecca, the railway station at Medina Saleh was renovated by ancient monuments of the UK, much of the stone work replaced by stone masons from Fort George near Inverness, Medina Saleh was built by the Nabatean people prior to Petra, I believe they built Petra due to the caravan trail for spices etc., moving to the costal region away from inland, followed the trail into Jordon, Wadie Rum, visited the cleft in the rock where the two foot prints are carved overhead, plenty water and cool inside just as Lawrence wrote in the book.
I am not a historian or anything like it! Just a bored Jock who spent 8 years working in Saudi, based in Yanbu, also mentioned in the book, the house he stayed at is now just a shell, shame as its part of the Saudi history, we sailed at the sharm where the British Destroyer almost ran aground also in the book, have loads of pictures, all in storage in the UK. All this took place in the early nineties before the troubles.
I even found Lawrence's house in London, its marked above the doorway, found it wondering about when my wife was running the London marathon, so that was the end of my quest, still got some relics from the railway and Ottoman forts that guarded the railway.
Aye found memories
B.
Read the book and have followed some of historical routes through Saudi & Jordan, had some great camp outs following the Hajj railway from Mecca, the railway station at Medina Saleh was renovated by ancient monuments of the UK, much of the stone work replaced by stone masons from Fort George near Inverness, Medina Saleh was built by the Nabatean people prior to Petra, I believe they built Petra due to the caravan trail for spices etc., moving to the costal region away from inland, followed the trail into Jordon, Wadie Rum, visited the cleft in the rock where the two foot prints are carved overhead, plenty water and cool inside just as Lawrence wrote in the book.
I am not a historian or anything like it! Just a bored Jock who spent 8 years working in Saudi, based in Yanbu, also mentioned in the book, the house he stayed at is now just a shell, shame as its part of the Saudi history, we sailed at the sharm where the British Destroyer almost ran aground also in the book, have loads of pictures, all in storage in the UK. All this took place in the early nineties before the troubles.
I even found Lawrence's house in London, its marked above the doorway, found it wondering about when my wife was running the London marathon, so that was the end of my quest, still got some relics from the railway and Ottoman forts that guarded the railway.
Aye found memories
B.
Nov 22nd 2007, 8:38 pm
#29
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Re: Lawrence's Vision for Arabia
But here we are now and did it make any difference ?
Am I being negative, Dean ?
Nov 22nd 2007, 8:43 pm
#30
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Re: Lawrence's Vision for Arabia
I do hope you are not Scottish BG...