A study of Britain's imperial policy in the Middle East over oil, finance and defence. This book brings together different accounts of British policy in the early 20th century, particularly in the Ottoman Empire, to reflect a consistent pattern of preoccupation, policy-making and diplomacy.

UK ties with Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf monarchies are under the spotlight as never before. Huge controversy surrounds Britain’s alliances with these deeply repressive regimes, and the UK’s key supporting role in the disastrous Saudi-led intervention in Yemen has lent added urgency to the debate. What lies behind the British government’s decision to place politics before principles in the Gulf? Why have Anglo-Arabian relations grown even closer in recent years, despite ongoing, egregious human rights violations? In this ground-breaking analysis, David Wearing argues that the Gulf Arab monarchies constitute the UK’s most important and lucrative alliances in the global south. They are central both to the British government’s ambitions to retain its status in the world system, and to its post-Brexit economic strategy. Exploring the complex and intertwined structures of UK-Gulf relations in trade and investment, arms sales and military cooperation, and energy, Wearing shines a light on the shocking lengths to which the British state has gone in order to support these regimes. As these issues continue to make the headlines, this book lifts the lid on ‘AngloArabia’ and what’s at stake for both sides.

“ An unknown and hitherto untold story of one of the true pioneers of the international oil industry.” William McGarvey was crowned the “ Petroleum King of Austria,” dubbed “ Europe' s Rockefeller,” advised the British government in the great debate over converting its naval fleet to oil fuel in preparation for World War I. His story is one that links Canada, the US, Austro-Hungary, Russia, and Romania.Today, we are witnessing a global campaign to bring to an end King Oil' s 150-year reign by shrinking the world' s reliance on fossil fuels. Yet the story of the early years of how the petroleum world evolved remains wrapped in obscurity. Crude Genius fills in an important gap in that history.The story of William McGarvey covers just five decades. Yet in that period, McGarvey became a leader in the procurement of oil, and raised it from a primitive act to a sophisticated international business. He transformed the primitive practice of oil extraction into a science and a powerful technology. He drilled and refined oil, he manufactured equipment and built pipelines.He created a global vision and brought that vision from North America to the Austro-Hungarian province of Galicia &– now part of Poland and Ukraine &– and made it for a time the third largest oil producing jurisdiction in the world. He expanded his empire to Russia and Romania. McGarvey was among a handful of individuals responsible for bringing petroleum to the brink of ubiquity. The arrival of World War I in 1914 solidified its global omnipresence.Crude Genius is based upon two decades of research in six countries. Gary May has also collected a massive photo archive that visually documents his detailed research.This book reads like an adventure story, full of intriguing characters, stretching many decades, engaging in numerous plots and subplots, through many countries. Most of all, this book informs us how the son of an Irish immigrant to Canada put down roots in a very small industry and ho

Travels in the Mogul Empire is the first authoritative translation into English of François Bernier's Histoire de la dernière révolution des états du Grand Mogol, published in Paris in 1670-71. Bernier was born at Joué in the Loire, France, and educated in medicine at the University of Montpellier. Desiring to see the world, he traveled to Syria and Palestine in 1654. He returned to the Middle East in 1656, where he lived for a year in Cairo before sailing south through the Red Sea with the intent of making his way to Gondar (in present-day Ethiopia). Upon learning that conditions there were unsafe for travel, he embarked on a ship bound for the port of Surat on the west coast of India. He remained in India for some 12 years, from 1658 to 1669. He initially served as personal physician to Dara Shikoh, the eldest son of the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan and the emperor's designated successor, and later worked for Daneshmand Khan, a nobleman in the court of Emperor Aurangzeb. Bernier witnessed firsthand the bloody civil war and succession struggle of 1656-59 in which Aurangzeb, a younger brother of Dara Shikoh, seized the Mughal throne. In 1664 Bernier traveled with Aurangzeb to Kashmir, "commonly called the paradise of India," becoming most likely the first European to visit the province. Bernier wrote several long letters to correspondents in France, in which he gave detailed descriptions of economic conditions and religious and social customs in northern India, including one to Jean-Baptiste Colbert, finance minister to King Louis XIV. These letters form part of Travels in the Mogul Empire. Along with his compatriots Jean Chardin (1643-1713) and Jean-Baptiste Tavernier (1605-89), both of whom he met on his travels, Bernier was the source of most of what Europeans knew about India in the late 17th century-early 18th centuries. Bernier was a thinker as well as an adventurer, and the book is replete with excursions on a range of topics, for example, on the nature of atoms, the Lost Tribes of Israel, winds and currents, rains, and the Nile River. There is also an appendix on the history of travel to India. The book contains a preface by the translator, Irving Brock, an English merchant banker who had literary interests. It has illustrations of notable people and scenes and three fold-out maps.

The Encyclopedia of Chinese Film, one of the first ever encyclopedias in this area, provides alphabetically organized entries on directors, genres, themes, and actors and actresses from mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan as well as 300 film synopses. Great care has been taken to provide solid cultural and historical context to the facts. The alphabetical entries are preceded by a substantial historical section, incorporating material on the the main studios and analysing the impact of Chinese film abroad as well as at home in recent years. This Encyclopedia meets the needs, equally, of * the film studies scholar * the student of Chinese culture * the specialist in Chinese film * the curious viewer wanting to know more. Additional features include: * comprehensive cross-references and suggestions for further reading * a list of relevant websites * a chronology of films and a classified contents list * three indexes - (one of film and tv titles with directors names and year of release, one of names including actors, writers, directors and producers and one of studios, all with pinyin romanizations) * a glossary of pinyin romanizations, Chinese characters and English equivalents to aid the specialist in moving between Chinese titles and English translations.