Samarkand, by Amin Maalouf, is a book divided into four parts. The first two tell the story of Omar Khayyam, around the year 1000 AD.

These first two parts take place in several cities of ancient Persia. Today, Samarkand is a city that belongs to Uzbekistan and was the scene of conflicts and the birthplace of a very famous poet: Omar Khayyam.

Much loved by some sultans (emperors), Khayyam was an astrologer

to noble figures around 1078 B.C. Remember that we are talking about a time when the rich and powerful made some decisions based on the position of the stars, so the opinion of an astrologer was important.

In addition to being an astrologer, Khayyam wrote rubaiyats,

which are 4-line poems where the first two lines rhyme with the last. At that time, writing rubaiyats (or rubais) was very frowned upon, so for years, Khayyam wrote them in secret...

The first two parts of the book portray Khayyam's life when he arrived in Samarkand, at the age of 24, in 1072. Upon arriving in the city, Omar accidentally got into a fight and the judge recognized that he was a cultured, calm guy who would not get into trouble.

It was ESSENTIAL for Omar to become the darling of the nobility and to spend his life studying the stars, drinking wine and writing his rubais for various situations that occurred.

One that really left a mark on me was when a very powerful sultan of the time, Alp Arslan, faced his enemy Yussef.

Arslan's army captures Yussef, ties him up and takes him to Arslan to kill him with a bow and arrow.

Arslan says that it is very cowardly to kill a tied-up guy and asks a soldier to untie him.

The truth is that Arslan had been ruling the empire for a long time and thought he was very powerful, so he wanted to kill Yussef with an arrow, while the guy was standing.

The soldier unties Yussef, who jumps on top of Arslan and kills him with a knife that was hidden.

Finally, Arslan dies, Khayyam finds out about everything and writes this wonderful rubaiyat that left a huge impression on me.

ENOUGH SPOILERS, LET'S GO TO THE NEXT TWO PARTS

The other two parts are written by a guy who HAD Omar's rubais notebook IN HIS HANDS! And everything takes place around 1889-1912

These dates are curious, aren't they? If we force our memory, we will remember that England and Russia shared influence in Persia during this period.

The guy in question is called Benjamin OMAR (!!) Lesage, who doesn't have that second name for nothing (I won't give away that spoiler, you'll have to read the book, ok)

Ben was an American who, curious about Khayyam's story, decided to go to Persia to find the rubais notebook...

When he got there, he found a nation in crisis. Some people supported implementing the Constitution in Iran/Persia, others were completely opposed, and in the midst of all this he approached people who wanted a model of democracy like the US already had at that time...

Ben returned to the US and continued to keep in touch with a very influential woman in Persia, who sent her letters.

Ben became famous in the city (Annapolis), became a reference in the Arab world and was invited to write a column in a small newspaper, always about Persia.

but the story ends with the sinking of the Titanic and a question that won't leave the reader's mind: "did these people really live through ALL THIS?"