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vortimer's review against another edition
4.0
Rather less whimsical than I expected. Lawrence seems a strange man, a total misfit, with torn loyalties.
He hints at childhood trauma, and you don't have to read between the lines far about his sexuality.
He hints at childhood trauma, and you don't have to read between the lines far about his sexuality.
mark_kivimaki's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
informative
reflective
tense
slow-paced
3.75
yasminfoster's review against another edition
Hard to follow and so many names to keep track of. It's a shame, because Lawrence writes descriptions of the desert and people very well.
uhambe_nami's review
5.0
Since battles and warfare are not really my thing, I am amazed how much I enjoyed reading Seven Pillars of Wisdom. In this beautifully written memoir, Lawrence gave us an honest account of his role in the Arab revolt, his hopes on making Damascus the capital of the Arabs, but also his doubts about the whole endeavor. I love how he blended in with the Arabs, learning their language and their customs, riding the camels in the Arab way, becoming one of them. That they loved him and accepted him as one of their own becomes clear in the final chapters leading up to the taking of Damascus, when the Arabs saw him negotiating with the English to get supplies and ammunition to prepare for the capture of the city:
Never could I forget the radiant face of Nuri Said, after a joint conference, encountering a group of Arab officers with the cheerful words, 'Never mind, you fellows; he talks to the English just as he does to us!'
The history is fascinating, and so are his descriptions of desert life, the sand storms and mirages, the annoying insects, the camels, and the oases. I found it beautifully written, well worth reading.
Never could I forget the radiant face of Nuri Said, after a joint conference, encountering a group of Arab officers with the cheerful words, 'Never mind, you fellows; he talks to the English just as he does to us!'
The history is fascinating, and so are his descriptions of desert life, the sand storms and mirages, the annoying insects, the camels, and the oases. I found it beautifully written, well worth reading.
lezreadalot's review against another edition
3.0
“Your good and my good, perhaps they are different, and either forced good or forced evil will make a people cry with pain. Does the ore admire the flame which transforms it?”
I finished this book and completely forgot about reviewing it! Which doesn't happen to me often. Gosh, this was a long one. And I mean, I've read way longer books than this, but this actually FELT really long. I was musing about it, about why this particularly felt so long and a little painful in parts, when I was sure that I would enjoy it. I've read and enjoyed non-fiction books about war before, and I don't mind dry-ish historical fiction. I was prepared for all the racism, intentional and unintentional both. But I think ultimately what made this kind of a slog for me was all the technical details and minutiae and the intricacies about war itself. I just wasn't very interested! T.E. Lawrence's writing is genuinely flat out beautiful, and I loved the bits where he talked about interpersonal relationships, cultural things he learned, some things about travel, his feelings about his own duplicity/complicity, and just any time we got insight into the man himself. He isn't as mired in the conservatism of the era, and some of his views were a pleasant surprise. He also had other views that were just racism dressed up as kindness/concern, but that was expected. It was also really interesting how he talked about his body, how he viewed it, how he was often repulsed by touch.
But yeah, the war/revolt itself was a little hard to get through. Like, it was interesting reading about how it came about, the goals of the Arabs and the different tribes, but having Lawrence take us through it step by step was not as engrossing as I'd have hoped. It was... a little boring! There were a few descriptions of battle/skirmishes that were interesting, but I can't really remember them/differentiate from all the others. It was also insightful to get a look at how warfare was carried out in the desert, but it was mostly such a slog. Sooooooo much travel time, sooooooooo many characters that I couldn't keep straight, soooooooooooooo much minutiae about things that I instantly forgot. We got some personal connection, but I needed ten times as much, because this really didn't capture my attention.
Listened to the audiobook as read by Roy McMillan, which was pretty good. Because of my wandering attention, I kept having to rewind and relisten to different sections, but that was the fault of the book, rather than the narrator. This is a historic figure I've always wanted to read about, and there was enough good in this book that I'm glad to have had the experience. I just wanted a bit more from it.
Content warnings:
Spoiler
war, death, descriptions of illness and grievous injury, beatings, torture, sexual assaultbluestarfish's review
4.0
Lawrence of Arabia spends an awful lot of time riding camels (and then the camels get weary and men run out of food so they eat the camels, happens all the time). As this is an autobiography of T.E. Lawrence's involvement in the Arab revolt there is a huge amount of military strategy talk and telling us about the long camel rides. I almost gave up reading a couple of times because of it as I felt I wasn't really able to make that much out of it. But what kept me going were the lyrical passages of description. His powers in that are truly immense, deft use of language and movement that brought me right into the landscape. Many times the experiences he and his men are going through (the only females around are the she-camels) are horrible: high heat/flies/sleeping in snow/thirsty/not eaten for three days etc and you get a glimpse of that, but so too of the beauty of the dessert and the sheer domination of spirit in remarkable ways.
I didn't know how to take some of his proclamations about his doings but he was clearly an intelligent man and had learned a lot by being in Arabia. So it was very interesting too between some of the boring bits, and I really found his descriptive powers to be amazing. It's not just one type of a book I guess. Reading about the battles there were many names familar due to current ongoing wars too... Complicated book about a complicated time and complicated place.
I didn't know how to take some of his proclamations about his doings but he was clearly an intelligent man and had learned a lot by being in Arabia. So it was very interesting too between some of the boring bits, and I really found his descriptive powers to be amazing. It's not just one type of a book I guess. Reading about the battles there were many names familar due to current ongoing wars too... Complicated book about a complicated time and complicated place.
lhunt54's review
4.0
This is such a unique piece of literature. I don't even know how to rate it. I think the only reason I don't give it 5 stars is because it is so dense and hard to follow at times without an intimate knowledge of the Middle East in Lawrence's time. This book is not for everyone because of that reason, but wow, what a great story, and in the man's own words as well. It's easy to see how he captivated the world over 100 years ago when he wandered into the desert a young man not yet 30 and came out the mysterious conqueror we know now as Lawrence of Arabia. There are some discrepancies between the film and the book, most of which I would argue are necessary, but that doesn't reflect on the book at all. Lawrence's account is both humble and arrogant, thorough and lacking, entertaining and drawn out. The more I learn about the man, the more I see historians arguing about who he really was. What he achieved, however, is quite remarkable. For anyone interested in the topic, I was just recommended a biography about Lawrence titled "Hero" that I'm going to read next that is supposed to be a bit more palatable. Either way, what a story and what a guy. He seems like the kind of man I wish I could have dinner with and spend an entire evening asking questions about what went on during his time in the desert.
revellee's review
5.0
I do not usually read history, especially not war history, but this is really a personal memoir that focuses on all the periphery details during this war. I love Lawrence's character and cultural descriptions, his notes on language/dialect use, his observations of attitudes and dress and conversations. There are some gruesome passages that are so descriptive not in just what was happening but also what he was thinking that it made me wince while reading. He endured a lot more than I think he bargained for and it sounds like it profoundly affected him in the worst ways mentally and physically. The despair and guilt he recounts is really heartbreaking, yet also somewhat relatable being a veteran who served during the recent Iraq and Afghanistan wars.
There is this one passage I read multiple times because it really struck me as a summation of not only his experience but even the past... 20 years of US involvement in the Middle East:
There is this one passage I read multiple times because it really struck me as a summation of not only his experience but even the past... 20 years of US involvement in the Middle East:
To him I confessed that I had made a mess of things and had come to beg of him to find me some small part elsewhere. I had put all myself into the Arab business and had come to wreck because of my sick judgement. The occasion being Zayed, own brother to Faisel, and a little man I really liked. I now had no tricks left worth a meal in the Arab market place and wanted the security of custom. To be conveyed. To pillow myself on duty and obedience irresponsibly. I complained that since landing in Arabia I had options and requests, never an order. I was tired to death of free will and many many things besides free will. For a year and a half I had been in motion, riding one thousand miles each month upon camels with added hours upon crazy airplanes or rushing across country in powerful cars. In my last five actions, I had been hit and my body so dreaded further pain that now I had to force myself under fire. Generally, I had been hungry, lately always cold. And frost and dirt had poisoned my hurts into a festering mass of sores. However, these worries would have taken their due petty place in my despite of the body, and of my soiled body in particular, but for the rankling fraudulence which had to be my mind's habit, that pretense to lead the national uprising of another race, the daily posturing in alien dress, preaching in alien speech with behind it a sense that the promises on which the Arabs worked were worth what their armed strength would be when the moment of fulfillment came. We had deluded ourselves that perhaps peace might find the Arabs able, unhelped and untaught, to defend themselves with paper tools. Meanwhile, we closed our fraud by conducting their necessary war, purely and cheaply. But now this gloss had gone from me. Changeable against my conceit were the causeless ineffectual deaths of Hissa. My will had gone, and I feared to be alone lest the winds of circumstance, or power, or lust blow my empty soul away.