< Back

Kayat, Assaad Y.
A Voice From Lebanon, with The Life and Travels of Assaad Y. Kayat.
Publisher: Madden & Co., London;
Date of Publication: 1847
Stock Code: 8580
FIRST EDITION. Octavo, pp. viii, 436. Lithographed portrait frontispiece of the Author from the original drawing by C. J. Basebe. Publishers’ original sage green cloth with gilt titles to spine and decoration in blind to spine and boards. Minor staining to cloth with slight wear at spine tips and corners. Minor light scattered foxing and a little minor corner creasing to leaves; frontispiece creased to tip of lower corner with small stain at tip of upper; small ink mark to verso of frontis but no annotation or inscriptions. A Very Good copy. First and only edition of this important travel classic, and arguably the first book written by a native Arabic speaker for a British audience. Assaad Yakub Kayat visited England in the middle years of the nineteenth century, and soon realised that the English people had very little understanding of his own background, culture and Syrian Christianity. This work is his attempt to bridge that cultural divide and he describes his early life in Beirut, his travels and experiences around the Middle East, and his trips to Europe and England including his medical training at St George’s London in the 1840s. In London, under the auspices of the Syrian Medical Aid Association, Assaad ultimately became British consul to Jaffa. Written in a lively and engaging style, his memoirs are still highly readable today. Rare, but especially so in the publisher’s original cloth; COPAC locates just 4 copies at British holdings. £1800.00