In this excerpt from the introduction to A Physician on the Nile, editor-translator Tim Mackintosh-Smith describes an earlier translation of the book (titled The Eastern Key), completed in the 1960s by means of séances with the author ʿAbd al-Laṭīf al-Baghdādī, who died in 1231. …There is, however, one extraordinary aspect to The Eastern Key, unparalleled … Continue reading “Like a séance with the dead”: An excerpt from the translator’s introduction to A Physician on the Nile