A Reed Shaken by the Wind: Travels Among the Marsh Arabs of Iraq

(Paperback, New edition)

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The Marsh Arabs of southern Iraq were one of the most isolated communities in the world. Few outsiders, let alone Europeans, had been permitted to travel through their homeland, a mass of tiny islands lost in a wilderness of reeds and swamps in southern Iraq. One of the few trusted outsiders was the legendary explorer, Wilfred Thesiger, who was Gavin Maxwell's guide to the intricate landscape, tribal customs and distinctive architecture of the Marsh Arabs. Thesiger's skill with a medicine chest and rifle assured them a welcome in every hamlet, and Maxwell's training as a naturalist and writer has left an invaluable record of a unique community and a vanished way of life.

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"This is prose close to poetry, written by a man of great perception and understanding."

Author Bio

Gavin Maxwell was born in the south-west of Scotland and was educated at a succession of schools before taking a degree in Estate Management at Oxford. He served with the Special Operations Executive during the Second World War, after which he bought the island of Soay. As well as his famous otter books - Ring of Bright Water and The Rocks Remain - he also wrote the critically acclaimed People of the Reeds, an account of the marsh Arabs of southern Iraq. He died in 1969.