First published in Vienna in 1937, this classic story of romance and adventure has been compared to Dr. Zhivago and Romeo and Juliet . Its mysterious author was recently the subject of a feature article in the New Yorker , which has inspired a forthcoming biography. Out of print for nearly three decades until the hardcover re-release last year, Ali and Nino is Kurban Said's masterpiece. It is a captivating novel as evocative of the exotic desert landscape as it is of the passion between two people pulled apart by culture, religion, and war.

It is the eve of World War I in Baku, Azerbaijan, a city on the edge of the Caspian Sea, poised precariously between east and west. Ali Khan Shirvanshir, a Muslim schoolboy from a proud, aristocratic family, has fallen in love with the beautiful and enigmatic Nino Kipiani, a Christian girl with distinctly European sensibilities. To be together they must overcome blood feud and scandal, attempt a daring horseback rescue, and travel from the bustling street of oil-boom Baku, through starkly beautiful deserts and remote mountain villages, to the opulent palace of Ali's uncle in neighboring Persia. Ultimately the lovers are drawn back to Baku, but when war threatens their future, Ali is forced to choose between his loyalty to the beliefs of his Asian ancestors and his profound devotion to Nino. Combining the exotic fascination of a tale told by Scheherazade with the range and magnificence of an epic, Ali and Nino is a timeless classic of love in the face of war.

庫爾班·賽義德（1905-1937），原名列夫·努辛鮑姆，化名艾薩德貝伊。猶太商人之子，生於高加索的阿塞拜疆。少年時代遷居德國。主要著作有《阿裏與妮諾》、《尼古拉二世傳》、《穆罕默德傳》、《東方的鮮血與石油》、《高加索：山巒、民族與曆史》等。

譯者簡介

楊德友，山西大學外語學院教授，北京市人。1956年入北京外國語大學波蘭語專業，1957年轉學到太原山西大學英語專業，1961年畢業留校工作至今。主要譯著有《俾斯麥迴憶錄》（第一捲）、《福地》、《巴爾紮剋的婚事》、《論基督徒》、《理解俄國》、《曆代耶酥形象》等。