Who needs a ladder when you’ve got a giraffe with an extended neck? 

The Ladderless Window-Cleaning Company certainly doesn't. They don’t need a pail, either, because they have a pelican with a bucket-sized beak. With a monkey to do the washing and Billy as their manager, this business is destined for success. Now they have their big break—a chance to clean all 677 windows of the Hampshire House, owned by the richest man in all of England! That’s exciting enough, but along the way there are surprises and adventures beyond their wildest window-washing dreams.

Included in Fantastic Mr. Fox and Other Animal Stories, on sale September 26

Available for purchase at:
<a href="http://www.us.penguingroup.com/nf/Book/BookDisplay/0,,9781611761832,00.html?Fantastic_Mr._Fox_and_Other_Animal_Stories_Chris_O%27Dowd">Penguin.com - Audiobook (CD format)</a>
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Fantastic-Mr-Other-Animal-Stories/dp/1611761832">Amazon - Audiobook (CD format)</a>
<a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/fantastic-mr-fox-and-other-animal-stories-roald-dahl/1114771370?cm_mmc=affiliates-_-linkshare-_-ev0de4uoclu-_-10%3a1&ean=9781611761832&isbn=9781611761832&r=1">Barnes & Noble - Audiobook (CD format)</a>


The Giraffe and The Pelly and Me by Roald Dahl, read by Hugh Laurie

A lovely extract from this wonderful audio edition of The Further Adventures of the Owl and the Pussycat. 

Gruffalo author, Julia Donaldson, revisits Edward Lear's favourite rhyme in this new story set in a nonsensical land full of adventure. When their beautiful golden ring is stolen, the Owl and the Pussy-cat must travel far from the safety of the Bong-tree glade as their search for the thief leads them across the Sea, to the Chankly Bore and beyond...



Julia Donaldson: The Further Adventures of the Owl and the Pussycat (Audiobook extract)

Penguin presents an extract from the unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of The Worst Witch Strikes Again read by Gemma Arterton.

Summer term at Miss Cackle's Academy for Witches has just begun and disaster-prone Mildred Hubble is in deep trouble again - all because of the new girl, Enid Nightshade, who isn't nearly as placid as she looks . . .

Jill Murphy: The Worst Witch Strikes Again (Audiobook extract) Read by Gemma Arterton

Listen to an extract from Princess Mirror-Belle by Julia Donaldson, read by Sophie Thompson.

A collection of funny and exciting Princess Mirror-Belle adventures.

From the bestselling author of The Gruffalo, Julia Donaldson, comes Princess Mirror-Belle, the exciting adventures of a princess with a difference. Princess Mirror-Belle is perfect for fans who are beginning to read on their own.

Ellen gets a big shock when her double appears out of the bathroom mirror. But Mirror-Belle is a double with a difference! 

She is a princess, and a very mischievous one at that. Join magically mischievous Mirror-Belle as she comes popping out of Ellen's mirror to sweep her into a variety of hilarious escapades - from battling with Dragon Pox to exploring a department store and helping out with the local pantomine. 

You can always guarantee that wherever Mirror-Belle goes, trouble will follow.

http://www.panmacmillan.com/book/juliadonaldson/princessmirrorbelle?format=978144728562501


Princess Mirror-Belle - Julia Donaldson

E231 | During the late Ottoman period, the Syrian Protestant College in Beirut became a leading center of higher education in the Eastern Mediterranean and for the Arab world in particular. With the establishment of British and French Mandates in the Middle East following the First World War, the Syrian Protestant College--now known as the American University of Beirut--became an educational hub not only for the Arab elite and middle class but also for local teachers and bureaucrats that would serve in the colonial mandate governments. In this episode, Hilary Falb Kalisman shares her research on the history of scholarship students from the British Mandates and their life at AUB during the interwar period, highlighting dimensions of class, nation, and transnationalism that emerged out of the educational experience and tracing the impacts of their education as they returned to serve in mandate and post-mandate independent governments of Iraq, Palestine, and Transjordan.

http://www.ottomanhistorypodcast.com/2016/03/AUB-british-mandate.html

Hilary Falb Kalisman is currently a visiting Postdoctoral Fellow at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University. She completed her PhD at the University of California-Berkeley in May 2015. Her research focuses on education in the Middle East during the Mandate period.

Huma Gupta is a Ph.D. student at the Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture (AKPIA) at MIT. Her dissertation research focuses on the structural relationships between urban planning, architecture, state formation and migration in modern Iraq. She is also interested in the sonic and visual past and continues to think of ways to integrate sensory histories into her research. 

Chris Gratien holds a Ph.D. from Georgetown University's Department of History. His research focuses on the social and environmental history of the Ottoman Empire and the modern Middle East. He is currently preparing a monograph about the environmental history of the Cilicia region from the 1850s until the 1950s.

Nir Shafir is a historian of the Middle East whose research examines the intersections of knowledge production, religious practice, and material culture in the early modern world (1400-1800). He curates Ottoman History Podcast’s series on history of science in addition to being one of the co-founders of hazine.info, a website that explores the archives and libraries of the Islamic world. He is currently an advanced doctoral candidate in the History Department at UCLA.

CREDITS

Episode No. 231
Release Date: 15 March 2016
Recording Location: Cambridge, MA
Editing and production by Chris Gratien
Special thanks to Kara Güneş for allowing us to use the composition "Istanbul" in the intro and outro music
Sound excerpts for archive.org: Baglamamin Dugumu - Necmiye Ararat and Muzaffer; Harmandali - Recep Efendi, Cemal Efendi
Images via Library of Congress and Before Their Diaspora
Bibliography courtesy of Hilary Falb Kalisman

The American University of Beirut and the British Mandates | Hilary Falb Kalisman

Zen Background - Part 15

Zen Background - Part 18

el-Kulubu’d-daria s.189-190
Imam Gazali - Hizbu’l-ihticab 20200324

حِزْبُ الْاِحْتِجَابِ لِلْإِمَامِ الْغَزَّالِيِّ

KD 189-190 Imam Gazali - Hizbu’l-Ihticab 20200324 - حزب الاحتجاب للإمام الغزالي

A riveting, deeply personal account of history in the making - from the president who inspired us to believe in the power of democracy.

In the stirring, highly anticipated first volume of his presidential memoirs, Barack Obama tells the story of his improbable odyssey from young man searching for his identity to leader of the free world, describing in strikingly personal detail both his political education and the landmark moments of the first term of his historic presidency - a time of dramatic transformation and turmoil.

Obama takes listeners on a compelling journey from his earliest political aspirations to the pivotal Iowa caucus victory that demonstrated the power of grassroots activism to the watershed night of November 4th 2008, when he was elected 44th president of the United States, becoming the first African American to hold the nation's highest office.

Reflecting on the presidency, he offers a unique and thoughtful exploration of both the awesome reach and the limits of presidential power, as well as singular insights into the dynamics of US partisan politics and international diplomacy. Obama brings listeners inside the Oval Office and the White House Situation Room and to Moscow, Cairo, Beijing and points beyond. We are privy to his thoughts as he assembles his cabinet, wrestles with a global financial crisis, takes the measure of Vladimir Putin, overcomes seemingly insurmountable odds to secure passage of the Affordable Care Act, clashes with generals about US strategy in Afghanistan, tackles Wall Street reform, responds to the devastating Deepwater Horizon blowout and authorises Operation Neptune's Spear, which leads to the death of Osama bin Laden.

A Promised Land is extraordinarily intimate and introspective - the story of one man's bet with history, the faith of a community organiser tested on the world stage. Obama is candid about the balancing act of running for office as a Black American, bearing the expectations of a generation buoyed by messages of 'hope and change', and meeting the moral challenges of high-stakes decision-making. He is frank about the forces that opposed him at home and abroad, open about how living in the White House affected his wife and daughters and unafraid to reveal self-doubt and disappointment. Yet he never wavers from his belief that inside the great, ongoing American experiment, progress is always possible.

This beautifully written and powerful book captures Barack Obama's conviction that democracy is not a gift from on high but something founded on empathy and common understanding and built together, day by day.

A Promised Land - written and read by Barack Obama

The first children's audiobook from Adam Kay.

A Sunday Times pick for audiobooks to listen to during lockdown. 

Explore each organ of the body in this immersive audiobook edition of Kay's Anatomy, read by Adam Kay with a full cast of voices, including Mark Gatiss, Sandi Toksvig, Andy Nyman and Lolly Adefope.

Do you ever think about your body and how it all works? Like really properly think about it?

The human body is extraordinary and fascinating and, well...pretty weird. Yours is weird, mine is weird, your maths teacher's is even weirder.

This book is going to tell you what's actually going on in there, and answer the really important questions, like:

Are bogeys safe to eat? Look, if your nose is going to all that effort of creating a snack, the least we can do is check out its nutritional value. (Yes, they're safe. Chew away!)

And....

How much of your life will you spend on the toilet? About a year - so bring a good book. (I recommend this one.) 

So sit back, relax, put on some rubber gloves and let a doctor take you on a poo- and puke-filled tour of your insides. Welcome to Kay's Anatomy*.

*a fancy word for your body. See, you're learning already.

The full cast includes: Andy Nyman, Joe Wilkinson, Rose Matafeo, Mark Gatiss, Dan Tetsell, Sandi Toksvig, Desiree Burch, Lolly Adefope, Mike Wozniak, Jan Ravens, Lucy Montgomery, Tom Allen, Henry Paker and Reece Shearsmith.

Stomach and Intestines - read by Andy Nyman and Jan Ravens

Puffin Books UK

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