Title: So What Went Wrong?
Product review: I must agree with Doug and others here, Lewis does not answer the self-imposed question he leads us to believe he will answer by the very title of his book. He spends an inordinate amount of time reviewing the social, economic, artistic, and governmental differences of the Ottoman period but says next to nothing about the early Islamic empire. I was very surprised he did not mention, but for one line, the great Sunni/Sh'ia schism which is fundamental to any Islamic study. Instead Lewis asks a great many questions but gives no answers. His final paragraphs are laden with there-is-always-hope reasoning but that really does not do for what purports to be a scholarly work. All in all, quite disappointing though an interesting read for the uninitiated. Just don't expect Lewis to give you the answers he claims to promise.
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