A History of the Muslim World - by Michael A Cook

About the Book

"In Michael Cook's words, this book is "about a substantial slice of human history delimited by a particular cultural characteristic: adherance to Islam in some form or other. [...] A commitment to Islam makes a difference. Wherever a society and its rulers have come to be Muslim, this has meant a major discontinuity with its pre-Islamic past and a significant expansion of its relations with the wider Muslim world." Starting in the pre-Islamic Middle East, Cook returns a sense of wonder to how Muhammad could not only become a prophet of a new monotheistic religion but also unite the Arab tribes behind it and create a state that would conquer much of the territory that belonged to the Byzantines and the Sasanians, the two empires that had balanced power in the region for hundreds of years. Exploring the high culture of the Abbasids, Cook then charts the disintegration of the Caliphate and the brief rise of the Fatimids and the Mongols of the Steppe. He covers the Ottomans (Turkish), Safavids (Iranian), Mughals (India), and ventures to East Africa, Madagascar, Somalia, Southeast Asia, and many places between. An epilogue gestures to major themes in the post-1800 world"--

Book Synopsis

A panoramic history of the Muslim world from the age of the Prophet Muḥammad to the birth of the modern era

This book describes and explains the major events, personalities, conflicts, and convergences that have shaped the history of the Muslim world. The body of the book takes readers from the origins of Islam to the eve of the nineteenth century, and an epilogue continues the story to the present day. Michael Cook thus provides a broad history of a civilization remarkable for both its unity and diversity.

After setting the scene in the Middle East of late antiquity, the book depicts the rise of Islam as one of the great black swan events of history. It continues with the spectacular rise of the Caliphate, an empire that by the time it broke up had nurtured the formation of a new civilization. It then goes on to cover the diverse histories of all the major regions of the Muslim world, providing a wide-ranging account of the key military, political, and cultural developments that accompanied the eastward and westward spread of Islam from the Middle East to the shores of the Atlantic and the Pacific.

At the same time, A History of the Muslim World contains numerous primary-source quotations that expose the reader to a variety of acutely insightful voices from the Muslim past.

Review Quotes

"A Choice Outstanding Academic Title of the Year"

"[A History of the Muslim World] is truly a tour de force. . . . An invitation to take advantage of a lifetime of scholarship . . . packaged for consumption by readers of every background and interest."-- "Choice Reviews"

"

A fascinating work. It is written in a lucid and witty style that always tempts you to carry on reading to the bottom of the page, and then to turn over to the next one.

"---John McHugo, interLib

"Glorious. . . . Necessarily a dense work, it is also delightful in its sheer scope and variety. This is especially true in a writer as witty as Cook, who sustains a breezy, Socratic style throughout. . . . The payoff for writing a book this ambitious and successful is that, for anyone interested in the history of Islam, Cook is now a must-read."---Andrew Bernard, Washington Examiner

"Cook tours the globe, bringing cultures and customs to life in evocative detail. . . . An accessible history of the Muslim world."-- "Publishers Weekly"

"A timely, wide-ranging examination of the Muslim world. . . . Cook's study sheds crucial light on Islamic development across borders and centuries."-- "Kirkus Reviews"

About the Author

Michael Cook is the Class of 1943 University Professor of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University. His books include Ancient Religions, Modern Politics: The Islamic Case in Comparative Perspective (Princeton), A Brief History of the Human Race, and The Koran: A Very Short Introduction.