The Man Who Would Be King: The First American in Afghanistan

The Man Who Would Be King: The First American in Afghanistan - Paperback

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The Man Who Would Be King: The First American in Afghanistan
  • The Man Who Would Be King: The First American in Afghanistan
The Man Who Would Be King: The First American in Afghanistan - Paperback

The Man Who Would Be King: The First American in Afghanistan - Paperback

by Ben MacIntyre
$25.99
$25.99

Book Overview

by Ben MacIntyre (Author)

The Man Who Would Be King is the riveting story that inspired Kipling's classic tale and a John Huston movie

In the year 1838, a young adventurer, surrounded by his native troops and mounted on an elephant, raised the American flag on the summit of the Hindu Kush in the mountainous wilds of Afghanistan. He declared himself Prince of Ghor, Lord of the Hazarahs, spiritual and military heir to Alexander the Great.

The true story of Josiah Harlan, a Pennsylvania Quaker and the first American ever to enter Afghanistan, has never been told before, yet the life and writings of this extraordinary man echo down the centuries, as America finds itself embroiled once more in the land he first explored and described 180 years ago.

Soldier, spy, doctor, naturalist, traveler, and writer, Josiah Harlan wanted to be a king, with all the imperialist hubris of his times. In an extraordinary twenty-year journey around Central Asia, he was variously employed as surgeon to the Maharaja of Punjab, revolutionary agent for the exiled Afghan king, and then commander in chief of the Afghan armies. In 1838, he set off in the footsteps of Alexander the Great across the Hindu Kush and forged his own kingdom, only to be ejected from Afghanistan a few months later by the invading British.

Using a trove of newly discovered documents and Harlan's own unpublished journals, Ben Macintyre's The Man Who Would Be King tells the astonishing true story of the man who would be the first and last American king.

Author Biography

Ben Macintyre is the author of several books, including The Englishman's Daughter (FSG, 2002). A senior writer and columnist for The Times of London, he was the newspaper's correspondent in New York, Paris, and Washington D.C. He now lives in London.

Number of Pages: 368
Dimensions: 0.99 x 8 x 5.54 IN
Publication Date: May 04, 2005
ISBN9780374529574
Author Ben MacIntyre
PublisherFarrar, Straus and Giroux
GenreBiography and History
FormatPaperback
PublishedMay 2005
LanguageENG- English
Pages368
Weight1.0 lb
Target AudienceAdults
Print SizeStandard Print

Related Subjects

Biography & Autobiography History Nonfiction

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About Ben MacIntyre

Ben Macintyre is a writer-at-large for The Times (UK) and the bestselling author of Agent Sonya, The Spy and the Traitor, A Spy Among Friends, Double Cross, Operation Mincemeat, Agent Zigzag, Rogue Heroes, and Prisoners of the Castle, among other books. Macintyre has also written and presented BBC documentaries of his work.

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