Peter Hessler is a staff writer at the New Yorker, where he served as Beijing correspondent from 2000-2007 and Cairo correspondent from 2011-2016. He is also a contributing writer for National Geographic. He is the author of River Town, which won the Kiriyama Book Prize, Oracle Bones, which was a finalist for the National Book Award, Country Driving, and Strange Stones. He won the 2008 National Magazine Award for excellence in reporting, and he was named a MacArthur fellow in 2011.
One of Kirkus Reviews' Best Books of 2019
“Original, richly layered, and often delightful reporting. Hessler
has a sharp sense of humor, a gift for observation, a healthy
skepticism, and a knack for using memorable characters and
anecdotes to demonstrate larger truths . . . This is what reporting
can be at its best: clear-eyed and empathetic, an addition to the
historical record.” —New York Review of Books
“Destined to become the title that all first-time visitors to Egypt
are urged to pack. . . . Hessler is an extraordinary writer.”
—Foreign Affairs
“Egypt’s tragedy has now found a non-fiction writer equal to
the task in Peter Hessler . . . What separates him from most other
foreign correspondents is a strange alchemy in his writing and
storytelling that gives him an ability to spin golden prose from
everyday lived experience. . . . [The Buried] is filled with
insight both about the cyclical nature of Egyptian politics and
what is eternal and unchanging in this most ancient of countries,
whose civilization goes back an astonishing, unbroken 7,000 years.
The result is a small triumph, one of the best books yet written
about the Arab spring.” —The Guardian
“Seen from afar, tectonic political shifts often look as if they
consume a society. But have you ever been someplace in the middle
of momentous political events and found everyone around you getting
on with daily life? Few reporters seem better placed to fathom the
complexities of this dynamic—ripples of disquiet permeating routine
existence—than Peter Hessler . . . The Buried: An Archaeology of
the Egyptian Revolution is Mr. Hessler’s closely observed, touching
and at times amusing chronicle of this tumultuous time. Drawing
both from daily life and from interviews with highly placed
political figures, the book is an extraordinary work of reportage,
on a par with Anthony Shadid’s Night Draws Near (2005) . . .
Sensitive and perceptive, Mr. Hessler is a superb literary
archaeologist, one who handles what he sees with a bit of wonder
that he gets to watch the history of this grand city unfold, one
day at a time.” —Wall Street Journal
“Beautiful and heartbreaking. Readers of his books on China will
know that Hessler has a genius for structuring a narrative. Here he
has crafted a miraculously coherent arc out of several disparate
themes: the political upheaval that accompanied the Arab Spring,
the lives of a handful of ordinary Egyptians, and his own education
in the language of contemporary Egypt and its ancient archaeology,
to name just a few . . . Every page is vivid and engaging, and each
chapter packs in surprises . . .The greatest contribution of The
Buried to the shelf of English-language books on the Arab Spring is
the intimately detailed depictions it provides of a handful of
ordinary, politically disengaged Cairenes trying to steer their way
through the chaos.” —David D. Kirkpatrick, Literary Review
“At once engrossing and illuminating. . . . Adroitly combining the
color and pacing of travel writing and investigative journalism
with the tools and insight of anthropological fieldwork and
political theory, this stakes a strong claim to being the
definitive book to emerge from the Egyptian revolution.”
—Publishers Weekly, starred review
“Nuanced and deeply intelligent—a view of Egyptian politics that
sometimes seems to look at everything but and that opens onto an
endlessly complex place and people.” —Kirkus, starred review
“A fascinating journey . . . This is writing at its best and highly
recommended for anyone interested in Egypt, modern or ancient.”
—Library Journal, starred review
"Hessler’s gift is stitching the stories of everyday lives into a
larger narrative. He creates indelible portraits of his encounters
with ordinary Egyptians, from his neighborhood’s garbage collector
to his translator, who grapples with being gay in a homophobic
society. This book helped me understand a place I hardly knew, one
that plays a key role in the ongoing political ferment of the
Middle East." —Seattle Times
“In The Buried, Peter Hessler brings to life the secret history of
the Arab Spring, masterfully weaving together a memoir of his time
in Cairo with the hidden, intimate lives of ordinary Egyptians.
With lyrical prose, Hessler introduces us to a side of the Middle
East we never see in news accounts: an enterprising garbage
collector, a gay man skirting police repression, an Arabic language
instructor nostalgic for the country’s socialist past. These
stories unfold on the backdrop of Egypt’s 5,000-year-old history,
as we learn about the parallels Egyptians draw to their pharaonic
past. Witty and deeply humane, The Buried is unlike any other book
I’ve read about the Egyptian revolution, and stands as a remarkable
testament to the country’s extraordinary history and to the
struggle for human freedom.” —Anand Gopal, author of No Good Men
Among the Living: America, the Taliban, and the War Though Afghan
Eyes
“Peter Hessler is one of the finest storytellers of his generation.
The beauty of his writing is subtle and cumulative—it gets under
your skin. After his years in China, Hessler moved with his family
to Cairo during the electric, chaotic days of protests in Tahrir
Square. Through him, you come to know many Egyptians as he came to
know them—casually, intimately, forming deepening ties. And through
them you experience Egypt’s turbulent recent history as it was
happening, as it felt to live through it.” —Larissa MacFarquhar,
author of Strangers Drowning: Impossible Idealism, Drastic Choices,
and the Urge to Help
“The Buried is the kind of book that you don’t want to end and
won’t forget. With the eye of a great storyteller Peter
Hessler weaves together history, reporting, memoir, and above all
the lives of ordinary people in a beautiful and haunting portrait
of Egypt and its Revolution.” —Ben Rhodes, author of The World As
It is: A Memoir if the Obama White House
“The Buried is wonderfully impressive, not a conventional travel
book at all, but the chronicle of a family's residence in Egypt, in
a time of revolution—years of turmoil in this maddening place. And
yet Peter Hessler remains unflustered as he learns the language,
makes friends, puts up with annoyances (rats, water shortages,
mendacity) and delves into the politics of the present and the
ancient complexities. It is in all senses archeology—tenacious,
revelatory, and humane.” —Paul Theroux
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