Serpent of the Nile: Women and Dance in the Arab World

For those just starting out to find out about Bellydancing & such enthusiasts,there are some pictures of famous older dancers, past & present .. Samya Gamal, Fifi Abdou & Sohair Zaki.
More like a collection of cameos than a real in-depth exploration of the Art Form, or Elucidation of the styles & Expression... but it IS a good coffee-table book & nice, informative read .

FOr the Pictures, if Nothing Else
I can't speak to the accuracy of Wendy Buonaventura's history of belly dancing, though I found no evidence of the most controversial complaint, that she fails to note the role of European Orientalists in fabricating our notions of Middle-Eastern dance. In fact, she discusses this very thing at length.

The treasure in the book is the collection of paintings. Where else can you see Dinet's gorgeous watercolors? I had never even heard of him. Are the pictures accurate? I suspect they are. Are they representative? Of course not. Like Gauguin in Tahiti, the Orientalists saw what they wanted to see.

Inspirational, but Flawed
Wendy Buonaventura obviously loves raks baladi ("country" or folkloric belly dance) with a passion. As sometimes happens with authors passionate about a subject, she unfortunately treats her opinions as facts upon occasion. As a dancer, I love the glorious Orientalist pictures, early 20th-century photos and fascinatingly slanted accounts from Western travellers, and I love her feelings for the dance. It's a beautiful book to peruse, and you can get some marvelous ideas for theatrical costuming from it. But like the Orientalists she reviews, Buonaventura presents an exotic and monolithic Middle East, where Egypt represents this entire diverse region and where nothing changes over time. She also perpetuates the popular myth that this is a *women's* dance, whereas in truth both sexes dance at private functions, and in both Egypt and Turkey, men historically performed as well. (Western tourists just weren't interested!) Read this for its lovely artwork and, if you're a dancer, for a feel-good spiritual connection with earlier dancers--but if you're interested in the subject of dance history, do some further research. And if you are involved in the Society for Creative Anachronism, PLEASE don't use this book for costume documentation. Egyptian clothing pre-1600 was very, very different.

great pictures but...
The quality and quantity of pictures in this book is wonderful and there is also some good information but unfortunately all the information is not very accurate and there are even many things that are not true. As a book this is nice to watch but as this book has become "a bible of belly dance" when other more accurate documents have been hard to find I can't rate this higher because readers tend to believe everything that is written here.

Or, Belly Dancing for Dummies! A Good Resource and Accessory
"Serpent of the Nile" is a wonderful book for anyone with an interest in Middle Eastern Dance, which is currently gaining tremendous popularity in the West. The author traces the art of 'Beladi,' what we now refer to as 'belly-dancing' from its origin to how it has changed over time. There is a lot of very interesting information in here, written concisely and accessibly, even for those of us who are not overly concerned with history; such as the need for male dancers to entertain the public when women were forbidden to do so, how the patriarchal nature of Arabic society affected Beladi, and how the Westerners exoticised and perhaps even corrupted the original form of dance. But the beauty of this book lies in its stunning pictures, a treat for the eyes! Photographs of sculptures, paintings and engravings of dancers and musicians fill the pages and make it an ideal coffee table book. A wonderful resource.