thwarted in his quest—a misunderstood innocent who became unwittingly entangled in the games of imperial intrigue and espionage that were rife in Central Asia at the time. Today, as Edward Fox so deftly illustrates, we have Csoma de Körös to thank for much of what we know about Tibetan culture. Fate eventually brought him to the Himalayas, where, in the freezing cells of Buddhist monasteries, he uncovered a vast ancient civilization hitherto unknown to the West. His was a sublimely strange life, a heroic example of scholarly masochism and obsession. Edward Fox is the author of Sacred Geography: A Tale of Murder and Archaeology in the Holy Land.

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