Sunday, 20 December 2015

1. Kashmir: A Disputed Legacy, 1846-1990

The Kashmir dispute has dominated Indo-Pakistan relations ever since independence, fifty years ago. It has also played a major part in the genesis of the Sino- Indian boundary dispute. In this award-winning book, Alastair Lamb examines the history of this dispute.

2. The Story of Philosophy

The Story of Philosophy: the Lives and Opinions of the Greater Philosophers is a book by Will Durant that presents a history of several Western philosophers and their ideas. It chronicles the ideas of the great thinkers, the economic and intellectual environments that influenced them, and the personal traits and adventures out of which each philosophy grew. The ideas of philosophers include–Plato, Aristotle, Bacon, Spinoza, Voltaire, Kant, Schopenhauer, Spencer, Nietzsche, Bergson, Croce, Russell, Santayana, James and Dewey. The Story of Philosophy is a key book for any reader who wishes to survey the history and development of philosophical ideas in the Western world.

3. History of the Arabs
History of the Arabs is a book written by Philip Khuri Hitti and was first published in 1937. Hitti spent 10 years writing this book. This authoritative study of the Arabians and the Arabic-speaking peoples is a valuable source of information on Arab history. Suitable for both scholars and the general reader, it unrolls one of the richest and most instructive panoramas in history, telling with insight the story of the rise of Islam in the Middle Ages, its conquests, its empire, its time of greatness and of decay. Hitti, one of the world’s leading historians of the Arabic-speaking people, gives an ideal introduction to their history and culture.

4. A Case of Exploding Mangoes
A Case of Exploding Man­goes by Mohammed Hanif, a Pakistani writer and journalist has written a fictional black comedy woven around the intriguing event of the assas­sination of the former Pakistani General and President, Zia ul Haq.
The book, A Case of Explod­ing Mangoes is loaded with dark humour and takes clever digs at the Pakistani political setup. Hanif’s writing style has been compared to Joseph Heller’s Catch 22, for its sharp and witty satire of the political and military regime. A Case of Exploding Mangoes is a bestseller and has received many awards, including the Best First Book Award in the year 2009 in the Commonwealth Book Prize ceremony.

5. Kashmir in the Crossfire by Victoria Schofield
Why has the valley of Kashmir, famed for its beauty and tranquility, become a major flashpoint, threatening the stability of a region of great strategic importance and challenging the integrity of the Indian state? This book examines the Kashmir conflict in its historical context, from the period when the valley was an independent kingdom right up to the struggles of the present day.

Drawing upon research in India and Pakistan, as well as his­torical sources, this book traces the origins of the state in the 19th century and the controversial “sale” by the British of the predominantly Muslim valley to a Hindu Maharaja in 1846. Through an exploration of the implications for Kashmir of independence in 1947, it gives a critical account of why, for Kashmir, self-determination may seem a more attractive option than affiliation to a larger multi-racial whole.

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