One of the 20th century’s greatest movies is David Lean’s 1962 epic Lawrence of Arabia. The story it tells — of the clash of cultures, of war, and of colonization — combined with the personal story of T.E. Lawrence during World War I, is one of high drama that is unforgettable to anyone who has ever seen it.

Yet, the events it tells seem too dramatic to be believed. Did Lawrence actually rescue a man in the desert, by himself and against the advice of his Arab allies who knew better? Did he actually later execute that man coldly to prevent a tribal war that would have destroyed the Arab revolt against the Ottoman Empire? Did he actually lead those Arab tribes across a deadly desert to take the town of Aqaba from the rear?

And did he actually lead that Arab revolt so successfully that it took Damascus ahead of the British, only to lose it because that medieval tribal culture knew nothing about modern technology?

For years I wondered about these questions and tried to find out. I read T.E. Lawrence’s own memoir of his time there, The Seven Pillars of Wisdom, and found it to be unclear and obscure, answering none of my questions. Other histories about World War I merely touched upon these events, treating them as a minor side show. And histories about the Middle East during that time seemed uninterested in telling this part of the story.

So, the questions remained: Did these events really happen? They seemed too good to be true.

I have now discovered that these stories are not only largely true, the reality of T.E. Lawrence’s life and his time in Arabia was even stranger than I could suppose. I learned this from Scott Anderson’s fine biography of Lawrence, Lawrence in Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly, and the Making of the Modern Middle East. Anderson not only unveiled Lawrence in all his inexplicable glory in this book, he made clear the complex political background that shaped the Middle East, and made it as we know it today.

First, there is Lawrence himself. From childhood he was a fearless individual quite willing to push his body beyond endurance. Fascinated at a young age with archeology and ancient architecture, at the ages of 18 and 20 he criss-crossed Europe on a solo bicycle tour to see its castles and ancient fortifications for a thesis he was writing at Oxford. He followed this up with a thousand-mile solo walking tour of the Middle East at the age of 21. Prior to the trip he mentioned it to archeologist David Hogarth, who was immediately horrified.

“I’m going,” Lawrence said.
“Well, have you go the money?” Hogarth asked. “You’ll want a guide and servants to carry your tent and baggage.”
“I’m going to walk.”
The scheme was becoming more preposterous all the time. “Europeans don’t walk in Syria,” Hogarth explained. “It isn’t safe or pleasant.”
“Well,” Lawrence said, “I do.”

On this journey Lawrence made friends with archeologist Leonard Woolley, becoming enamoured with his archeological work in Syria. Lawrence soon joined him, and the next five years, until the start of World War I, were probably the happiest in Lawrence’s life, working on archeology digs in Syria. He loved the work. He loved the land. And he loved the people.

When the war started however those digs ended, and the only way Lawrence could get back to the Middle East was through the war department. His personal on the ground knowledge of the Middle East and its people was priceless, though it took the British a ridiculously long time to realize it. And so he was sent to Arabia to help Faisal and the Arab revolt fight the Turks.

Once there, almost everything described in David Lean’s movie occurred, though for dramatic reasons some events and individuals were combined or rearranged. Lawrence did save a man who was lost in the desert, against the advice of the Arabs with him. He did execute a man in cold blood to prevent a tribal war. Unlike the movie, these were separate events spaced in time, and involved two different men. But both happened, in exactly the circumstances describe.

T.E. Lawrence, in Arabia

In fact, practically every event described in Lean’s movie happened more or less as Lean and his screenwriter, Robert Bolt, portrayed it. Lawrence did propose taking Aqaba from the rear by crossing a desert the nomadic Arabs normally avoided, a victory that made Lawrence’s name forever with British officials and allowed him the power to lead that Arab revolt into Damascus. Along the way the savagery of the war changed Lawrence, making him more brutal and robbing him of the innocent love of Arabia he once had.

As I noted, the movie does compress characters and events in order to tell the story practically in a single film, but it remains remarkably true to reality, in almost every way. Such dedication to truth in art is now rare in our world. For their art, filmmakers now think it perfectly okay to rewrite history to fit their own moral and political beliefs, even if it makes no sense. Lean and Bolt refused to do this, and as a result produced a movie of true greatness.

Scott Anderson’s book however is possibly greater, because it provides more depth than any movie can. He not only tells Lawrence’s story clearly in a way that makes the reading easy, he provides the larger context of the story so you understand the reasons why things happened as they did. No one is really the villain, except maybe the Germans who started it all with their desire to conquer France and Europe. That greedy desire forced the French and British to act in their own defense, and in doing so forced them to impose their own will on the Middle East, sometimes in a dishonest and two-faced manner.

The final consequence was the Middle East of today. If you want to understand with some depth why the Arabs are the way they are, I strongly recommend you read Anderson’s book.