Rarely has the literary world been more successfully hoodwinked than by Ikbal and Idries Shah . . . I was hooked from the first page.--Miranda Seymour, author of Robert Graves: Life on the Edge

In this dual biography of the father and son shapeshifters Ikbal and Idries Shah, Nile Green has given us a funhouse mirror of Great Britain's alter ego as its empire unraveled. Green chronicles the Shahs' ever-multiplying monikers, mythical backstories, prolific spinning of tales of derring-do, royal lineage, and esoteric mysticism with unflappable flair. And when you think it can't get any more fantastic, Doris Lessing pops up in Peshawar, following her Sufi master Idries in shilling for the mujahideen just as the Holy War is getting underway. In an age when identities aspire to be fixed, cultural appropriation is frowned upon, and borders are locked shut, the Shahs perfected the art of trespass.--Deborah Baker, author of The Last Englishmen

This scholarly and hilarious tale of the Shahs, father and son, and their decades of fabrications, is one of a kind. Nile Green is an exquisite writer, and his book is more droll, erudite, and delightful than anything the Shah family ever came up with.--Peter Theroux, translator and author of Sandstorms

This rollicking tale of the beguiling father and son duo Ikbal and Idries Shah is a thrilling exploration of the space that Islam occupied in the western imagination over the span of the twentieth century. Some of the Forrest Gump-like encounters will leave your jaw on the floor and the Catch Me If You Can intrigue of it all will keep you turning the pages. Nile Green, one of the world's foremost scholars on Islam, has written a truly extraordinary, accessible, and timely book--Shahan Mufti, author of American Caliph

Green's finely wrought narrative presents father and son as, in some ways, boxed into their grift by the strictures of Britain's racist society and its Orientalist expectations; at the same time, the duo's genuine love of poetry and spiritualism is palpable. This nuanced and erudite account dives headfirst into the messy contradictions of life under British imperialism for colonial subjects.-- "Publishers Weekly"

[A] remarkable father-and-son biography.-- "Booklist"

Green shows how, by dint of hard work, brazen fraud and a mastery of 'the occult energies of identity, ' over the course of the 20th century, first father and then son became recognized as experts on the East in general and Afghanistan in particular, helping to shape how those places were viewed on both sides of the Atlantic.--Robyn Creswell "New York Times"

[A] superb book... it highlights the pervasive influence of esoteric religion--often of a Sufi tinge--in the increasingly post Christian West.--Fitzroy Morrissey "Literary Review"

A solid, eminently readable work of scholarly detection and high-toned chicanery.-- "Kirkus (starred review)"

[A] forensic study of high-level deceit and hucksterism.--Justin Marozzi "The Spectator"

Nile Green's Empire's Son, Empire's Orphan is so entertaining that you wonder if it can all be true. It is, and its truths are more than biographical... Mr. Green, a specialist in Islamic history... describes how Idries detached Sufism's popular mysticism from Islamand claimed Templars, Mithraists and even Charles de Gaulle as secret Sufis. His version of Sufism was a "spiritual freemasonry," a key to the mysteries in paperback form.--Dominic Green "Wall Street Journal"

One had been taken for a ride, but it was fun while it lasted, spiced with tall tales of the occult... The story of how father and son spun yarns from a web of aliases, concocted titles, and Orientalist fantasies has its pleasing ironies.--Jonathan Conlin "Los Angeles Review of Books"

The most absorbing and wide-ranging page-turner I've read this year. Nile Green delivers treasure-chests of history and suggestiveness with such panache, such wit and such erudition that I couldn't stop reading. The economy and dash with which he illuminates the complexities of Empire, from World War 1 to the psychedelic Sixties and beyond, are as enthralling as they are eye-opening.--Pico Iyer, author of The Art of Stillness and The Half Known Life

Nile Green has done an excellent job tracing the various careers, achievements and ambitions of Ikbal Shah (1894-1969) and his son Idries (1924-96) ... It makes a fantastic detective story for Professor Green to unravel, in part because the truth was as strange as any of their fictions.--Barnaby Rogerson "Times Literary Supplement"

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Pub date: 2024-07-02

Length: 384 pages