The fascinating story of 18th-century Syrian storyteller Hanna Diyab, who was caught up in a series of fabulous adventures that led him to the court of Louis XIV - and a role in the creation of one of the most famous stories in the world: Aladdin.
I reviewed the new Jordanian film Theeb for BBC Radio's flagship arts programme Front Row.
I was interviewed for the BBC Oxford music show Global Echoes about my Middle East writing and my music choices.
Maps divide Jerusalem's walled Old City into four quarters, yet that division doesn't reflect the reality of mixed and diverse neighbourhoods. This full-length 'biography' is an evocation of place through story, led by the voices of Jerusalemites.
Daybreak in Gaza humanises the people dismissed as mere statistics and ‘collateral damage’ and portrays Gazan lives full of joy and meaning. This remarkable book seeks to preserve the heritage that has been lost, and that which can never be lost.
A collection of previously published travel writing, journalism and essays from more than ten years of exploring the Middle East, published independently and available as paperback and e-book.
A fun and interesting story to research, looking at projects in Jordan, Indonesia, Morocco and the UK to build environmentally sound mosques and/or convert existing mosques to renewable energy by fitting solar panels and water recycling facilities.
I enjoyed going deep into the detail for this long story on Ithra, a new cultural centre in Saudi Arabia. It's an extraordinary building, in conception, design and execution, and the work done there has the potential to shift the outlook of a nation.
My story from Kurdistan, in northern Iraq, on the efforts being made to preserve the cultural heritage of Amedi, a small, ancient town in a dramatic mountain-top location that still has mosques, churches and (ruined) synagogues within steps of each other.
As far as we know, David Dorr was the first African American ever to visit Jerusalem - enslaved and yet powerful. I stumbled across the incredible story of this laconic, funny, literate and sharply observant man by chance. He is amazing.
I was lucky to be commissioned to write about the music events taking place over summer 2017 as part of London's biennial Shubbak festival, subtitled “A Window on Contemporary Arab Culture”—a literal play on the Arabic word 'shubbak', which means window.
It's the world's southernmost city and the gateway to Antarctica – but why does nobody stick around in the Argentinian port of Ushuaia? I discovered a town that has forgotten its own story.
For the UK's Society of Authors, I interviewed Marcia Lynx Qualey, founder of the "ArabLit" blog, website and journal, about building a worldwide audience for Arabic literature in English.
Deep in the forests of northern Jordan, you’ll find a long, low building of pale limestone. It represents the future for a new generation of environmental conservationists, and also embodies the design aesthetic of a boundary-breaking Jordanian architect.
A story I spent ten years pitching, finally published in 2018. The editor titled it "Hike Palestine", but it's not a travel piece at all. Palestinians are rediscovering a connection to the land. People are out walking again. This was a joy to write.
I co-produced this Radio 4 documentary on artist Peter Shenai, as he modelled the form of Hurricane Katrina and reproduced the shape as bells, exploring the responses his bells evoked as they were struck in New Orleans by survivors of the storm
I went to Paris to talk to political analyst and cultural commentator Sultan Al-Qassemi about his work as founder & director of the Barjeel Art Foundation, based in Sharjah, UAE, collecting and promoting modern and contemporary Arab art around the world.
My deep dive into Qatar's mammoth ten-year project to digitise collections on Gulf history held at the British Library in London – the whys and wherefores, and what it shows about Qatar's ambitions in knowledge-gathering and cultural production.
What a delight, to produce this documentary by the brilliant poet Bridget Minamore, looking at the ways women - and particularly women of colour - have resisted dominant narratives in poetry across different cultures and eras to define their own creativity
I was floating in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, halfway between Brazil and Congo, a hair’s-breadth off the Equator, when I realised that Craig was yelling into his snorkel.
There were fish everywhere. Dozens of blackfish – the local name for...
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). My report on shifting identity in the Falklands, talking to Zimbabweans, Chileans and others who are choosing to settle on these South Atlantic islands.
I produced this programme for BBC Radio 4's On Your Farm slot, from Bluff Cove in the Falkland Islands, talking to Hattie & Kevin Kilmartin about how they combine sheep farming with penguin tours – including unexpected emotion when recalling the 1982 war.
My Radio 4 documentary and BBC News piece on the tension facing conservationists in the Falkland Islands between conserving penguin habitats and the UK's international obligation to clear minefields left over from the 1982 war with Argentina.
He stands. The hubbub dies down. Those seated, awaiting their food, listen with respect as a speech dwelling on the importance of tradition flows past their ears. The words reach back across the centuries to highlight those who came before, then...
In an undistinguished commercial district of Amman, off one of the narrow streets that winds between the Jordanian capital’s towering hills, I reach for the spittoon. But it’s too late. The Sauvignon Gris – light, fresh, delicious – has already...
I researched, wrote, presented and produced this stand-alone documentary for BBC World Service examining the longstanding links of culture and identity that persist between the Falkland Islands and South America.
At 10.20pm on Saturday 1 August 2009, a man walked along Nachmani Street, a residential road in central Tel Aviv. He went into the apartment block at number 28 and down a flight of steps to the basement flat, where a song by Blur was playing on...
Qena lurks on the edge of things. This southern Egyptian city stands close enough to the tourist hotels of Luxor – 60-odd kilometres – that nobody stays, but far enough away that...
Judaism may have originated in the Middle East but the Jews were long ago scattered far and wide - to the Gulf, among other places. Few now remain, except in Iran. But a century ago there was even a proposal to found a Jewish state at an oasis near...
In the Place of Snakes, on the grassless plains west of the Qatari capital, Doha, businessman Hasan Al Khalifa tucks his feet underneath him and directs his eldest son, Abdullah, out to the paddocks behind the house. "Before, we had nothing,"...
I remember Syria. Walking there was like swimming in an ocean. In Syria I became puny. I remember the vaulted chambers of the castle, that very old castle, shiplike on its hill in the summer heat, guarding the gap in the mountains that leads from the...
A travel piece from Jerusalem. Most visitors stay in the Israeli west of the Holy City. But stay in the occupied Palestinian east, and you find a different world.
On the way to Antarctica I visited Ushuaia, a port town at the very southern tip of Argentina, and learned about frontier folk, ethnic cleansing, tax breaks for industry... it was a strange time.
On the Münsterhof cobbles, drizzle pooled around a stone commemorating British statesman Winston Churchill’s call for a “United States of Europe”. Placid Zurich may be famous for banks and shopping, but its conservatism is...
My account of a journey all the way up the Nile from Cairo to Aswan in 2013, in the short gap between the revolution and the clampdown, when tourism in Middle Egypt seemed like it might have a future.
"Dubai?" The camel farmer plumps his cushions, shifts on to the other buttock and takes another sip of coffee. "Dubai is not Arab. There's nothing there." He pauses and a cool breath of evening wind brings us a whiff of the desert – subtle and...
My Radio 4 documentary and BBC News piece on Antarctica, following weather presenter Peter Gibbs on his journey back to the remote Halley research station, where he spent 2 years in the 1980s, examining new science & grappling with the cold and isolation.
A story of family and journeys across the generations, in an ancient place with a hundred centuries of ghosts. Travel writer Matthew Teller takes his kids to Feynan, in the stony deserts of southern Jordan.
A travel piece following a new joint Palestinian/Israeli initiative on a food tour on both sides of the 'Green Line' border between Israel and the West Bank.
I wasn’t expecting to find such nerviness on a four-day getaway. Losinj (say it “losheen”) doesn’t hurry. This Croatian island, out on a limb at the unfashionable northern end of the Adriatic, is the definition of far-flung. Zagreb is a continent away...
She shimmied right here. Or it might have been there. Or – down a bit, over a bit – ooh yes, just there. Summoning up the ghost of the ancient world’s most erotic dancer atop a windblown Jordanian mountain demands imagination, but once...
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). Antarctic geopolitics: why are so many different nations jockeying for position on the ice, building bases and welcoming tourists?
Last Saturday was a giorno festivo, a public holiday, according to the timetables of Autopostale Ticino, the network of post-buses operating in Italian-speaking Switzerland. And on giorni festivi a Sunday service operates. But this crucial nugget...
Do you want to go to Shag ar-Reesh?" What an offer. "Shag: canyon. Reesh: feathers. The Canyon of the Feathers. It's that way." Chris - wiry, enthusiastic, English - pointed over my shoulder into the cool blackness beyond the terrace railing, where the...
An extraordinary meeting in the Syrian city of Aleppo in 2007, long before the war.
I sat waiting, focused ahead. The cross-traffic started thinning out. I gave a twist with my right hand, just a touch, till I felt the bite. The lights changed to green. I gave it a bit more. The automatic clutch caught, and I was rolling...
In 1930s Kuwait, an accusation that a restaurant was serving cat meat might easily have ended badly for the owner. But in one case British diplomats decided it was a matter for the Crown - and rode to the rescue of the unlucky man, writes Matthew Teller...
A journey of 100 metres, to and fro across a small bridge that divides the town of Ponte Tresa - half in Italy, half in Switzerland - to try and feel what marks our differences.
Early in World War Two, just after the fall of France, Britain's agent in the Gulf sheikhdom of Sharjah noticed an alarming rise in support for Nazi Germany. Slipping on a disguise he quickly found out who was responsible, reports Matthew Teller...
Britain's ties with Saudi Arabia stem from the exploits of a dashing diplomat, Capt William Shakespear - an explorer and pioneering photographer. If he hadn't met an early death while photographing a desert battle scene, asks Matthew Teller, would we...
If knowledge is power, then the British government's secret gazetteer of the Gulf, known simply as "Lorimer" after its author, epitomises the scale of imperial ambition. Intended to be a portable handbook, it was anything but, writes Matthew Teller...
Teenagers were dreaming of fame and fortune as a musician long before downloads, CDs or even vinyl. The Singing Sailor of Oman is one young man whose dream came true in the 1930s, as his fusion of Arabic and Indian musical styles became a hit...
At a time of international conflict two centuries ago, did Britain assassinate an enemy agent while the world was looking the other way? Matthew Teller delves into a story of intrigue and possible skulduggery in Persia.
Less than a century ago, oil had yet to be discovered in Arabia. The region was poor and one of its main sources of income - pearl fishing - was about to be killed by cheap competition and the intransigence of colonial administrators...
In 1932, amid a global economic slump, the impoverished Saudis came to London looking for a loan. They also had an offer: would Britain like to try drilling for oil? A disdainful Foreign Office mandarin gave the fateful reply...
Office etiquette is such a minefield. Is it better to stick to the rules, or bend them? How chatty should emails to your boss be? Back in 1929, writes Matthew Teller, one British Indian diplomat took his breezily informal approach a bit too far.
Telegraph Island in Oman: the hardship posting to end all hardship postings. To get there, writes Matthew Teller, British officers went round the bend – literally, and perhaps sometimes metaphorically too.
A transgender singer hits stardom in Baghdad. Officials scramble to impose order after a Kuwaiti restaurant is found to be selling cat meat. Gulf royals on an official visit to London are left marooned in a drab south London suburb because of a shortage...
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). The hardships and injustices faced by the stateless 'bidoon' of Kuwait.
It’s early on a weekend morning, and the gates are closed. But someone, somewhere, must have given a signal, because the uniformed officials end their milling and move into place. One tilts his peaked cap to scratch his forehead. Another laces her...
Until 2008 Jordan had produced only one truly homegrown feature film. It was Egypt that blazed the trail for Arab cinema, followed by Morocco, Algeria and others. Cairo’s film industry in the 1940s, ’50s and ’60s was prolific, and many productions from...
“I was ten years old—I’ll never forget it.” Ahmed Boug gazes across a hazy desert view from the highlands above Taif, in western Saudi Arabia. “We’d set off for a camping vacation in Abha, up in the mountains. This was before there was even an asphalt...
Down by the lake, Hussein Al-Doseri is beaming. "Before all this, there were no services here—no trails, no routes. Now it's easy." An athletic 30-something in a white T-shirt and wraparound sunglasses, Al-Doseri stretches his arms wide toward the...
In west Beirut, Hamra Street’s fashion boutiques and upmarket coffee shops form a strip of commerce that points toward the landmark Murr Tower on the edge of downtown. A block or two north, past clusters of auto workshops and convenience stores, lies...
A fingernail moon hung over the table-flat desert as Salah al-Mahdhoury, my biologist guide, and I are served dates and fresh fruit by Shaykh Muhammad bin Thamna al-Harsusi, one of the leaders of the Harasis tribe of central Oman. We rest on...
I wrote and presented this documentary shadowing Tom Fletcher, Britain's ambassador in Lebanon, examining his impact, his innovative use of social media and his approach to 'naked diplomacy' – informal, open and accountable.
I produced this documentary on the conservation challenges facing Ascension Island, a tiny scrap of British territory marooned in the tropical mid-Atlantic, halfway between Brazil and Africa. Presented by Peter Gibbs.
Even now, weeks later, I’m not sure why I cried. The tears were flowing before I reached the summit: I remember looking up into the blurry blue. I also remember, further back down the trail, when the old, familiar voices started to sing to me about...
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). My six-week journey to visit Halley, the most remote of Britain's research stations in Antarctica.
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). The growth and social impact of independent cinema in Jordan.
I have been interviewed for BBC World News TV, Sky News, BBC Outside Source, World Radio Geneva, BBC Oxford, Radio New Zealand, and others.
I produced this edition of the BBC World Service history programme Witness, talking to meteorologist Peter Gibbs about his journey back from Antarctica in 1982, when he was caught up in the outbreak of the Falklands War between Britain and Argentina.
A breeze moves the leaves of aspens in the night gloom. One branch holds another, creaking. Marcus Eldh, our guide in the vast forests of central Sweden, speaks like the air, in a whisper. “They are here. All around us.”
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). Talking to Christians in Dubai, visiting churches and gauging attitudes towards Christianity.
Trust my boots? What does he mean, trust my boots? Just look at that slope! It’s slippery. The rocks down there, the furious sea. The mountains are watching. There are people behind me. Why should I trust my boots? I don’t trust my boots! But the...
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). Reporting from Doha, on how sudden wealth hasn't necessarily been a wholly positive experience for Qatar and Qataris.
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). The 100th anniversary of the first flight along the River Nile – and an unexpected diplomatic connection.
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). How hunters and conservationists in central Sweden are finding that – when it comes to the return of wolves – they don't always disagree.
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). Social disquiet in the Upper Egyptian city of Minya, as tourism along the Nile starts to pick up.
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). Reporting from Muscat and Salalah in Oman, on the challenges to authority posed by the growth in social media.
I was a studio guest on the Radio 4 travel programme Excess Baggage, talking here to presenter Sandi Toksvig about plans to build a railway linking the Gulf states.
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). The social implications of a new environmental scheme in the Saudi capital, Riyadh.
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). Reporting from the Jordanian capital Amman on why the city is seeing an unexpected influx of arrivals from Libya.
I reported from Jordan for this edition of the Radio 4 travel programme Traveller's Tree, on a new homestay programme being developed there.
My documentary for BBC radio on the longstanding links between Arab royals and Britain's Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, using archive, analysis and new interviews to examine the relationship.
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). Riding the controversial new light rail line through the divided city of Jerusalem.
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). The rose industry of Taif in Saudi Arabia – and a strange meeting in the airport.
FOOC > "From Our Own Correspondent" (BBC radio). The mood around Cairo's Tahrir Square in April 2011, in the midst of the revolutionary uprisings.
Beam yourself down into Neuchâtel, and for a while you might think you’ve landed up in France. The Neuchâtelois people are the most French-oriented in Switzerland, speaking a dialect of Swiss-French that is celebrated – by those for whom such a thing is...
The westernmost of the major Italian lakes, lying wholly within Piemonte, Lake Orta appears an afterthought, a little croissant-shaped tarn that is closer to the Matterhorn than Milan. Perhaps that’s why it is relatively quiet, seeing a fraction of the...
Consistently overlooked and underrated by travellers to the Middle East, the Jordanian capital Amman stands in marked contrast to its raucous neighbours, with none of the grand history of Damascus, not a whiff of Jerusalem’s tension and just...
When outsiders want to poke fun at the Cotswolds, they invariably aim first at Stow-on-the-Wold. Over the last 10 or 15 years, a succession of journalists from the London papers – visiting chiefly to review one or other of the restaurants – have taken...
Ali Juma Al-Araimi rubbed his chin. “No, I don’t know anything about Sindbad,” he said, and leaned on the heavy teak door of his workshop, masts of replica miniature dhows rising behind his shoulder. “But ask on the shore around sunset. People might know."
The honey-seller smiled, and lifted his ladle high. Golden honey streamed down and the warm air in his little shop filled with a mouthwatering aroma – in a mental flash I instantly recalled sunny fields of scented flowers and childhood treats...
Out in the desolate Baal Thayfer – the “Place of Camel Droppings” – Mabkhot Al Amiry hefts his blade, choosing where to make the first cut. A breath of wind breaks the silence, rattling the papery bark of the tree in front of us with a sound like…
When he visited Abu Dhabi thirty years ago, travel writer Jonathan Raban wrote that the city “was like a hotel… everyone was in transit. Even the [locals] had been turned into guests, en route from a nomadic past to a sketchy future.” Today...