Book Launch and Celebration!

Saturday, August 28, 5pm

Arabia: In Search of the Golden Ages

Michael Hamilton Morgan

Arabia follows Morgan and the IMAX crew as they travel through modern-day Saudi Arabia as well as back into time – to the ancient Nabatean kingdom that flourished there 2,000 years ago, and the Arab Golden Age that began in Makkah with the Prophet Muhammad in 600 and ended about 1250.

Arabia is enriched by never-before-seen photographs of the Nabatean ruins atMadain Saleh, the holy city of Makkah and the shrine of the Ka’ba; the surging cities of Riyadh, Jeddah and Dhahran; and futuristic centers like the $10 billion KAUST, the world’s newest research university.

The book examines the issues central to Western perceptions of the Arabs, including the rights of women, the role of religion, roots of extremism and pace of political reform. And it challenges the reader to place those things in the context of a culture that evolved from utterly different roots than those of the West – deep isolation, searing heat, brutal drought and a nomadic quest for survival. At the same time, Arabia shows how many historical, intellectual and economic ties bind the West to the Arabs, as much as differences push them apart.