Empress of the Nile
The Daredevil Archaeologist Who Saved Egypt's Ancient Temples from Destruction
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Narrated by:
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Lisa Flanagan
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By:
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Lynne Olson
About this listen
New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice • The remarkable story of the intrepid French archaeologist who led the international effort to save ancient Egyptian temples from the floodwaters of the Aswan Dam, by the New York Times bestselling author of Madame Fourcade’s Secret War
“A female version of the Indiana Jones story . . . [Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt] was a daredevil whose real-life antics put Hollywood fiction to shame.”—The Guardian
In the 1960s, the world’s attention was focused on a nail-biting race against time: the international campaign to save a dozen ancient Egyptian temples from drowning in the floodwaters of the gigantic new Aswan High Dam. But the coverage of this unprecedented rescue effort completely overlooked the daring French archaeologist who made it all happen. Without the intervention of Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt, the temples—including the Temple of Dendur, now at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art—would currently be at the bottom of a vast reservoir. It was an unimaginably complex project that required the fragile sandstone temples to be dismantled and rebuilt on higher ground.
Willful and determined, Desroches-Noblecourt refused to be cowed by anyone or anything. As a member of the French Resistance in World War II she survived imprisonment by the Nazis; in her fight to save the temples she defied two of the most daunting leaders of the postwar world, Egypt’s President Abdel Nasser and France’s President Charles de Gaulle. As she told one reporter, “You don’t get anywhere without a fight, you know.”
Desroches-Noblecourt also received help from a surprising source. Jacqueline Kennedy, America’s new First Lady, persuaded her husband to help fund the rescue effort. After a century and a half of Western plunder of Egypt’s ancient monuments, Desroches-Noblecourt helped instead to preserve a crucial part of that cultural heritage.
©2023 Lynne Olson (P)2023 Random House AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
“Lynne Olson’s many fans know her gift for storytelling and for bringing to life heroes who may not be well known but who demand—indeed, rivet—our attention. Who else but Olson could have found Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt, a beautiful and brave French resistance fighter brazen enough to tell her Gestapo interrogators to stand up when a woman enters the room, and who happens to be a kind of female Indiana Jones working behind the scenes—alongside Jackie Kennedy!—to save the ancient temples of Egypt? Readers will devour this wonderful book.” (Evan Thomas, New York Times bestselling author of First: Sandra Day O’Connor)
“Empress of the Nile is an exhilarating, in-depth look at a woman whose courage never faltered, whether she was facing Nazi interrogators, backstabbing archaeologist colleagues, or the imminent destruction of the Egyptian monuments and artifacts she held most dear. Olson’s richly detailed, heart-stopping biography takes the reader for a magnificent ride.” (Fiona Davis, New York Times bestselling author of The Magnolia Palace)
“Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt was one of the leading Egyptologists of the twentieth century, yet her remarkable achievements have received little attention. Lynne Olson has done her justice with this comprehensive biography.” (Toby Wilkinson, New York Times bestselling author of The Rise and Fall of Ancient Egypt and Tutankhamun’s Trumpet)
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- Length: 12 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Unknown Empire begins with a barefoot Ethiopian army defeating thousands of European soldiers in 1896. As the only African nation to never be conquered, they defeated Mussolini during WWII. With the West dying but Africa booming, Ethiopia faces population control leaders such as Bill Gates and the U.N. in an epic confrontation for the future of civilization. In all these confrontations, the ark of the covenant plays a central role for Ethiopians who believe that they have held the world's most famous object since before the time of Christ.
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Much more than I expected
- By Johnny V. on 09-21-21
By: Dean W. Arnold
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Three Tigers, One Mountain
- A Journey Through the Bitter History and Current Conflicts of China, Korea, and Japan
- By: Michael Booth
- Narrated by: Julian Elfer
- Length: 10 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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There is an ancient Chinese proverb that states, "Two tigers cannot share the same mountain." However, in East Asia, there are three tigers on that mountain: China, Japan, and Korea, and they have a long history of turmoil and tension with each other. In his latest entertaining and thought-provoking narrative travelogue, Michael Booth sets out to discover how deep, really, the enmity is between these three "tiger" nations and what prevents them from making peace.
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Not much new here if you are already familiar
- By Neil Richert on 07-13-20
By: Michael Booth
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The Man in the Glass House
- Philip Johnson, Architect of the Modern Century
- By: Mark Lamster
- Narrated by: Mark Bramhall
- Length: 17 hrs and 19 mins
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Award-winning architectural critic and biographer Mark Lamster's The Man in the Glass House lifts the veil on Johnson's controversial and endlessly contradictory life to tell the story of a charming yet deeply flawed man. A roller-coaster tale of the perils of wealth, privilege, and ambition, this book probes the dynamics of American culture that made him so powerful and tells the story of the built environment in modern America.
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Disappointing!
- By David G Dempsey on 07-12-19
By: Mark Lamster
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The Buried
- An Archaeology of the Egyptian Revolution
- By: Peter Hessler
- Narrated by: Peter Hessler
- Length: 16 hrs and 44 mins
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Overall
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Performance
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Drawn by a fascination with Egypt's rich history and culture, Peter Hessler moved with his wife and twin daughters to Cairo in 2011. He wanted to learn Arabic, explore Cairo's neighborhoods, and visit the legendary archaeological digs of Upper Egypt. After his years of covering China for The New Yorker, friends warned him Egypt would be a much quieter place. But not long before he arrived, the Egyptian Arab Spring had begun, and now the country was in chaos.
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A Fascinating, Funny, and Moving Account of Egypt
- By Jefferson on 07-23-19
By: Peter Hessler
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Oblivion or Glory
- 1921 and the Making of Winston Churchill
- By: David Stafford
- Narrated by: Gerard Doyle
- Length: 10 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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This is an engaging and original account of 1921, a pivotal year for Winston Churchill that had a lasting impact on his political and personal legacy. After the tragic consequences of his involvement in the catastrophic Dardanelles Campaign of World War I, Churchill’s political career seemed over. He was widely regarded as little more than a bombastic and unpredictable buccaneer until, in 1921, an unexpected inheritance heralded a series of events that laid the foundations for his future success.
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Great explanation if this great m Chirchill’s an
- By David Hitchins on 10-25-20
By: David Stafford
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The Fisherman's Tomb
- The True Story of the Vatican's Secret Search
- By: John O'Neill, Sarah Wynne, Katie Clark
- Narrated by: Paul Michael
- Length: 4 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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In 1939, a team of workers beneath the Vatican unearthed an early Christian grave. This surprising discovery launched a secret quest that would last decades a quest to discover the long-lost burial place of the Apostle Peter. From earliest times, Christian tradition held that Peter, a lowly fisherman from Galilee, whom Christ made leader of his church was executed in Rome by Emperor Nero and buried on Vatican Hill. But his tomb had been lost to history. Now, funded anonymously by a wealthy American, a small army of workers embarked on the dig of a lifetime.
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Great narrator
- By Fran on 09-10-18
By: John O'Neill, and others
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The Nile: Travelling Downriver Through Egypt's Past and Present
- The Vintage Departures Series
- By: Toby Wilkinson
- Narrated by: Peter Ganim
- Length: 12 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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The Nile, like all of Egypt, is both timeless and ever-changing. In this audio, renowned Egyptologist Toby Wilkinson takes us on a journey downriver that is both history and travelogue. We begin at the First Nile Cataract, close to the modern city of Aswan. From there, Wilkinson guides us through the illustrious nation birthed by this great river.
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A Riverboat Cruise from the luxury of your phone
- By Amazon Customer on 02-20-20
By: Toby Wilkinson
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Panama Fever
- By: Matthew Parker
- Narrated by: Oliver Wyman, William Dufris
- Length: 17 hrs and 43 mins
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Overall
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The building of the Panama Canal was one of the greatest engineering feats in human history. A tale of exploration, conquest, money, politics, and medicine, Panama Fever charts the challenges that marked the long, labyrinthine road to the building of the canal. Drawing on a wealth of new materials and sources, Matthew Parker brings to life the men who recognized the impact a canal would have on global politics and economics.
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Good book, marginal narrator
- By CmH - HB, CA on 06-02-08
By: Matthew Parker
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In Europe's Shadow
- Two Cold Wars and a Thirty-Year Journey Through Romania and Beyond
- By: Robert D. Kaplan
- Narrated by: Paul Boehmer
- Length: 10 hrs and 52 mins
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Overall
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In Bucharest, Romania's capital, Kaplan discovered that few Westerners were reporting on the country - one of the darkest corners of Europe during the Cold War. In an intense and cinematic travelogue, Kaplan explores the history and culture of the only country in the West where the leading intellectuals have been right-wing rather than left-wing; a country that gave rise to the dictator Ion Antonescu, Hitler's chief foreign accomplice during WWII; a country where the Latin West mixes with the Greek East, producing a fascinating fusion of cultures.
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Wrestling with History
- By David on 03-07-16
By: Robert D. Kaplan
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Midnight at the Pera Palace
- The Birth of Modern Istanbul
- By: Charles King
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 12 hrs and 12 mins
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Overall
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Performance
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At midnight, December 31, 1925, citizens of the newly proclaimed Turkish Republic celebrated the New Year. For the first time ever, they had agreed to use a nationally unified calendar and clock. Yet in Istanbul - an ancient crossroads and Turkey's largest city - people were looking toward an uncertain future. Never purely Turkish, Istanbul was home to generations of Greeks, Armenians, and Jews, as well as Muslims.
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INTERESTING SUBJECT - CONFUSED WRITING
- By The Louligan on 01-18-15
By: Charles King
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The Buried Book
- The Loss and Rediscovery of the Great Epic of Gilgamesh
- By: David Damrosch
- Narrated by: William Hughes
- Length: 7 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
One day in 1872, self-taught Assyriologist George Smith was sifting through a pile of clay tablets when he realized he was reading about "a flood, storm, a ship caught on a mountain, and a bird sent out in search of dry land". This is the riveting story of the discovery of the world's first literary epic, the "Epic of Gilgamesh".
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interesting- but not for everyone
- By J Michael on 07-16-08
By: David Damrosch
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Balkan Ghosts
- A Journey Through History
- By: Robert D. Kaplan
- Narrated by: Nigel Patterson
- Length: 12 hrs and 56 mins
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Overall
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From the assassination that triggered World War I to the ethnic warfare in Serbia, Bosnia, and Croatia, the Balkans have been the crucible of the 20th century, the place where terrorism and genocide first became tools of policy. Chosen as one of the Best Books of the Year by the New York Times, and greeted with critical acclaim as "the most insightful and timely work on the Balkans to date" (The Boston Globe), Kaplan's prescient, enthralling, and often chilling political travelogue is already a modern classic.
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Anti religious/anti catholic hit piece
- By Daniel Calvert on 05-04-21
By: Robert D. Kaplan
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Paris Reborn
- Napoléon III, Baron Haussmann, and the Quest to Build a Modern City
- By: Stephane Kirkland
- Narrated by: Robert Blumenfeld
- Length: 8 hrs and 53 mins
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Overall
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Traditionally known as a dirty, congested, and dangerous city, 19th Century Paris was transformed in an extraordinary period from 1848 to 1870, when the government launched a huge campaign to build streets, squares, parks, churches, and public buildings. The Louvre Palace was expanded, Notre-Dame Cathedral was restored and the French masterpiece of the Second Empire, the Opra Garnier, was built.
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Why Paris looks the way it does today
- By Neil Chisholm on 11-28-13
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What listeners say about Empress of the Nile
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- Steven Arthur
- 07-27-24
A well-told story of history and an amazing life.
Thoroughly written and presented, this is a rich, detailed story of a woman responsible for, among other things, the saving of Abu Simbel. This masterful rescue happened in the late 1960s while I was in high school. It was the subject of a term paper I researched the old fashioned way in the library stacks.
I was fortunate to visit Abu Simbel in person in 1997 during a trip to the Middle East. Breathtaking to say the least.
I highly recommend this book.
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- K. A. Carroll
- 06-09-23
I have new appreciation for Abu Simbel!
This was a great story that even when I was in Egypt, I didn’t hear about. I love the side stories of Jackie Kennedy, and and others who came to influence the process by which our heroine saved so much. This is my third book by the author, and I’ve loved all three.
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- WZell
- 06-02-24
Must read for travel to Egypt
This book explains the entire history of archeology in Egypt. Includes world politics and within the archeological profession. I have a much better understanding and appreciation of the Pharaohs, what they left behind and why. This is much better than my guides in Egypts and my readings before the 2 week trip.
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- N. Richman
- 12-18-23
Extremely interesting and well written
I have studied Egyptian art history, and this book taught me things I had not heard before. This book is very well written, and researched. The subject is an incredible person with a love for Egypt that brings the subject to life. If you enjoy Egyptian art, this is a must read.
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- Debbie S.
- 04-15-24
A life well-lived
Well written history of Derrick’s-Noblecourt, archaeology, and Egyptology and the global politics involved. A fascinating account of how she managed the seemingly impossible challenge of saving the Egyptian temples from destruction. This exceeded my expectations.
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- Nathan R.
- 02-29-24
A Fine and Exciting Read!
This book was outstanding. As an archaeologist with a keen interest in Egyptology, I found it very informative. The chapters about WWII were thrilling and educational, and overall I liked the pacing. I have enjoyed learning more about specific locations in Egypt, and the history of moving the southern temples due to the Aswan Dam. The narrative brings together French culture, military history, archaeology, geopolitical concerns, and museum studies, all tied together by the fascinating story of this one woman’s life. I was hooked!
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- Beaumont Twomiles
- 10-20-23
Wonderful story!
I have to write at least 12 words so I recommend listening to it it.
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- EmmieLara
- 11-14-23
Excellent I learned something new
I visited Egypt. I saw the temple at Abu symbol. I heard how it had been moved. This woman had a fascinating life.
I was happy to learn how these things came to be
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- Hannah Sowerwine
- 10-15-24
The history we just returned from visiting Egypt. It was great to get all this additional information
Liked the history and reader and the links between Christian and Jackie Kennedy in saving the antiquities
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- :)
- 05-11-23
Couldn't put it down!
From start to finish, this story gave passion and history. 10 out of 10 can't wait to read it again.
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