Michael Haag knew Lawrence Durrell (and met Gerry and Margo) and is currently writing a biography of Lawrence Durrell for Yale University Press, which also published his Alexandria: City of Memory, a definitive study of Cavafy, Forster and Lawrence Durrell in the city. Haag has also written widely on the Egyptian, Classical and Medieval worlds and is the author of a dozen books, including, for Profile, The Tragedy of the Templars and The Quest for Mary Magdalene.
This real life story of the Durrell family is fascinating - Haag brilliantly traces their footsteps in pre-war Corfu, England and India -- Simon Nye, Writer, ITV 's The Durrells These pages conjure the restorative, redemptive atmosphere of sunlight on stone. Observer Praise for The Quest for Mary Magdalene [A] well-researched and page-turning history ... a narrative as clue-rich as a thriller. Sunday Times Praise for The Tragedy of the Templars: 'Haag is a romantic pluralist, with an instinctive taste for the esoteric, the independent and the defeated; and a corresponding distrust of victors and orthodoxies. TLS Praise for The Templars: History and Myth 'Here at long last is a history of the Knights Templar - and their secrets - that you can believe in. Scotsman