ALEXANDRIA: CITY OF MEMORY

First edition, first printing. Signed by the author. Inscribed presentation copy. Publisher's original black cloth with gilt titles to the spine, in dustwrapper. Illustrated with photographs in black and white throughout the text. A fine copy, the binding square and firm, bright and fresh. The contents are clean throughout. Complete with the fine original dustwrapper that is a little rubbed at the spine tips and otherwise without fading, loss or tears.

Inscribed by the author in purple ink on the title page "For Frank / with thanks / for your help / and support / - Michael / September 2004". Michael Haag (1943-2020), writer, traveller, historian and photographer. The book is a literary, social, and political portrait of Alexandria at a high point of its history. Drawing on diaries, letters, and interviews, Haag recovers the lost life of the city, its cosmopolitan inhabitants, and its literary characters, folding intimate accounts of E. M. Forster, Greek poet Constantine Cavafy, and Lawrence Durrell into the story. He recounts the city's experience of the two world wars and explores the communities that gave Alexandria its unique flavor: the Greek, the Italian, and the Jewish.