This collection of essays by Professor Selim Deringil brings together his work from the 1980s and 1990s into a single book. Deringil, an expert on the transformation of the Ottoman state during the nineteenth century, writes here about several peripheral areas of the Ottoman Empire as well as the central state’s attempts to reassert itself. Articles on Egypt, North Africa and Iraq concern the friction between the centre and local power-bases, while the Ottoman approach to Muslims in the Russian Empire or missionary efforts in Hawaii show how the state looked beyond its borders. Included are also articles on the Turkish republic and how its foreign policy developed in the post-Ottoman context, providing an interesting contrast. Deringil’s works should be familiar to Ottoman historians, and this particular collection provides easy access to his essays in one volume.