British journalist and author Michael Vatikiotis went to the Middle East in pursuit of his Levantine roots, and found forgotten stories about vanished communities

Lives Between The Lines: A Journey in Search of the Lost Levant, by Michael Vatikiotis, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2021, 368 pages

Michael Vatikiotis is a British journalist and author, and the son of P.J. Vatikiotis, an expert on the politics of the Arab world in the second half of the 20th century. Vatikiotis the father lectured at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London, among other places, and wrote many books, the best known of which deal with the history of modern Egypt. He is also center of the story told by Vatikiotis the son about the role played by European and half-European communities – Greeks, Italians, Armenians and Jews – in Egypt, and Palestine too, during the century between the first half of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century.