It is the summer of 1982 and Beirut is under siege. Eighteen-yearold Ivan’s parents have just been evacuated from the city with other members of the Palestine Liberation Organisation. Ivan stays on, interpreting for international medical volunteers in Sabra refugee camp by day, getting stoned with them by night, and working undercover for the PLO. Hoping to get closer to Eli, a Norwegian physiotherapist, he helps her treat Youssef, a camp orphan disabled by a cluster bomb. An unexpected frie...

The birth of Qur’anic calligraphy was a major event in the early history of Islam. In a few decades, it raised the Arabs and their language from the remote fringes of the civilised world to its very heart. The Rise of Islamic Calligraphy explores the resonance of the Ancient notion of proportion in Arabic script and breaks new ground in our understanding of a crucially important body of material: the earliest manuscripts of the Qur’an. George highlights the historical context of early Arab...