ABSTRACT
My life span of one half century has been spent largely on the shores of the eastern Mediterranean, one half of this in Lebanon. In this essay, I have sought to come to terms, not with the course of my own private life, but with the temporal and geographical context in which it has been spent. This half century, from the mid-twenties, has been one of radical and often violent change, one too complex to reduce to any pattern or be seen, by any one person, more than partially and subjectively. In this sense, this study of Lebanon is personal and, inevitably, partly autobiographical. It seems pertinent, therefore, to state briefly the bare facts of my life.
