I Never Had a Bestseller : The Story of a Small Publisher Book

This is rather dry reading if one is not completely obsessed with medieval military architecture. I picked it up because it's by T. E. Lawrence. There's almost nothing about Lawrence himself in the book since it's his thesis about castles. What is fascinating is that it took him many years of traveling trough England, France, and the Near East to gather the information in order to write this. Many of his travels were done on bicycle. I'm sure his pre-war adventures helped prepare him for his role in the war as "Lawrence of Arabia". (I think in a letter somewhere he complains about the Arabs tearing-up the Hejaz railway. Ironically, that's exactly what he'll be doing during the war. Lawrence the Train-Wrecker.) The book contains excellent photographs taken by himself. The section on Krak des Chevaliers is my favorite, with great photographs. The section on the castles of France is also very nicely done. This edition has a thorough introduction by a scholar of the subject. In it he discusses Lawrence's ideas and thesis in light of current (1988) historical and archeological evidence.