Description: In the story of the efforts of Blisses and Dodges to build the American University of Beirut with alternating audacity, arrogance, generosity, paternalism, and vision, the author sees an allegory for the larger history of the U.S. in the Middle East.
Review Quotes: ""A highly original contribution to our understanding of America's troubling relationship with the Middle East. VanDeMark . . . tell[s] a multigenerational story about the founding and growing influence of the American University of Beirut (AUB) over the last one hundred fifty years. It is the story of a turbulent and complicated love affair between America's earliest Christian missionaries and the Arab world. . . . VanDeMark has written a concise and highly accessible history of the American missionaries and their political and intellectual legacy." Kai Bird, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and author ofCrossing Mandelbaum Gate: Coming of Age between the Arabs and Israelis, 1956-1978"An enlightening history centered on the AUB and its influence in the Middle East. . . . Setting the university against the backdrop of . . . conflicts and political power struggles . . . VanDeMark's closing chapters skillfully document post-9/11 anti-Americanism in the Middle East."Publishers Weekly "An excellent study of a neglected subject. It should be of interest to anyone concerned about US relations with the Middle East and the continuing difficulties we face in the region." Robert Dallek, Presidential historian"With the fastidious care of a historian and the passion of one who understands the significance of the AUB to the United States and the Middle East, VanDeMark tells the fascinating story of the intertwining history of the university and its founding families with America's diplomatic and political involvement in the region. In a style that is both accessible and absorbing, he concisely traces the evolution of one hundred fifty years of history that is a prerequisite for understanding America's challenges in the Arab world today and posits that the AUB can still offer, rather than impose, the best of American values."Ann Kerr-Adams, Former student, teacher, and member of the Board of Trusteesof the American University of Beirut and author of Come with Me from Lebanon