News
Penguin’s wise Iraqi deal
Penguin has acquired The House of Wisdom by acclaimed scientist and broadcaster Jim Al-Khalili for a high six-figure sum.
Editor Will Goodlad bought world rights from Patrick Walsh at Conville & Walsh for what the latter described as "a very, very large offer", pre-empting auction bids from six other publishers.
Al-Khalili is an Anglo–Iraqi physicist and regular television and radio broadcaster who has lived in the UK since fleeing Iraq as a teenager. The House of Wisdom, his first non-scientific work, describes the history of Baghdad's famous library, which was established in the ninth century to translate and house all the literature available in the world at that time.
"This is a story that hasn’t been written before. . . the story of the Arabic Enlightenment between the ninth and 13th centuries," said Walsh.
See Also
Related
- Fry memoir to Penguin
- Puffin takes on two big names
- Penguin picks up prostitute
- Aurum signs Drogba
- Granta questions Allen Lane blurb
Book news from the BBC
- Aid worker diary: Part 13
- What next for George W Bush?
- Confused by the cult of Tintin? You're not alone
- Helicopters go on final flypast
- Donkeys boost Ethiopian literacy
Latest Comments
- One of the consequences of downloable audiobooks is the democratization of...
- This is what I'm on about. 'Killer in a Small Town' be screened on Channel...
- blimey ray - not sure what you are on about but i6 made interesting reading
- Something else...look away if you get scared easy...when you have been a...
- The past couple of decades have proven that these corporate drones live on...
RSS
Subscriber Content