A History of Iran
Empire of the Mind

It is a well written and informative overview for those people like me who do not know much about Iran and want to discover its history and culture. I assume, that as with many such books, if one possess extensive pre-requisite knowledge, she might find a lot of gaps or might not agree with the inev......more

Iran has a literary and poetry tradition few countries (Russia) can go near. US citizens usually reduce it all to owning a copy of Collected Rumi while geographically learning of it from the Flock of Seagulls, “Iran so far away”. What they don’t know is that in today’s Iran, “only 1.4 percent of the......more

An excellent history of ancient Persia, the origins of the country up to the present day, or rather 2007 when the book was written. I especially found the ancient history and pre-Islamic religions, such as Zorastrianism interesting. Axworthy describes the leaders of that ancient religion, its develop......more

Michael Axworthy is a former member of the British Foreign Service who is now a lecturer at the University of Exeter in Arab and Islamic Studies. Unsurprisingly, his specialty is Iran and in this book he presents a well-organized chronology of the area now known as Iran and the peoples that have inh......more

Axworthy introduced the book by calling it "an introduction to the history of Iran for a general readership, assuming little or no prior knowledge." That is basically true...but if that is where you are coming from, you are most likely going to find some sections slower going than others. The first......more