Arabic cooking is the most exciting new influence on avant-garde British cookery. The incredible balance of spices and fruit, the piercing aromas of herbs, devastating sweetmeats: described by authors such as Claudia Roden and Anissa Helou - these will make a real impact in restaurants and in our homes. This book gives the necessary historical foundation. Arab cookery has identifiable links with the magnificent courts in Baghdad, the Levant and Egypt which were catalysts of a fusion of Classical and (most vital of all) Persian cuisine. The recipes and practices of the medieval Arab world are of more than just antiquarian utility. Claudia Roden acknowledges their inspiration in her foreword, particularly as explained to herby the legendary French linguist, sociologist and scholar Maxime Rodinson. "Medieval Arab Cookery" has 3 authors. There are translations of 2 complete medieval texts. The first is the pioneering translation of a 13th-century cookbook by the late Professor A. J. Arberry. Hitherto, it has been locked in a back-number of the journal "Islamic Studies" since its first printing in 1939. Then, there is a translation of a 15th-century cookbook (reflecting Egyptian practices) by the American scholar, Charles Perry - this is new, the source never before explored. French essays by Maxime Rodinson are here translated, some for the first time, covering the influence of Arab cookery on the medieval West, and including a study of early medieval Arab cookery literature. Finally, Charles Perry has written a dozen essays on medieval Arab cookery. He is the most active scholar in this field in the world today. His contributions to the famed Oxford Symposium on Food and Cookery since 1981 are a highlight of its proceedings. He writes for a living for the "Los Angeles Times". Claudia Roden, Britain's best writer on Middle Eastern cookery, writes a foreword and an appreciation of the work of her friends.

Islam and Capitalism is a learned, engaged rebuttal of the cultural reductionism of Max Weber and others who have tried to explain the politics and society of the Middle East by reference to some unchanging entity called 'Islam,' typically characterised as instinctively hostile to capitalism. Maxime Rodinson looks at the facts, analysing economic texts with his customary common sense, to show that Muslims never had any trouble making money.

Maxime Rodinson has long been known in Europe as one of the foremost interpreters of Arab history and thought. In this concise overview of the Arab people and their distinctive culture, the author discusses the extend to which Arabs can be defined by religion, language, or race; surveys the Arab diaspora; examines modern Arab nationalism; and questions the degree to which it is possible to generalize about the Arab people and their "personality."

In the wake of the uprisings which rocked the Arab world, Maxime Rodinson's work has taken on a new and powerful resonance. Dating from 1958, the time of his expulsion from the French Communist Party, to 1972, the assembled articles, papers and essays which form this book outline his vision of the role of Marxist politics in Muslim history and society. By applying a materialist approach to Islam, which encompassed its social and economic history rather than simply studying it in terms of belief, Rodinson reclaimed the field of Islamic studies from Orientalism. Rodinson's work was both pioneering and provocative. Today, when an increasingly virulent Islamophobia is taking hold across the West, Rodinson's work provides a vital counterweight to reductionist depictions of Islam and remains just as indispensable to those seeking to understand the Muslim World as it was when it was first published.

For centuries the Islamic world has, by turns, been both reviled and admired in the West. Since the time of the Crusades, Europeans have viewed Muslim culture and religion through the unique distorting lens of Orientalism, colouring all aspects of their perception and generating a curious blend of fascination and distrust. Historian, sociologist and Middle East specialist Maxime Rodinson presents an account of this relationship, in a history that is balanced and concise yet insightful.