What is the author's perspective in the nonfiction book, The Adventures of Ibn Battuta, a Muslim Traveler of the Fourteenth Century?

Dunn is a scholarly writer with the perspective of a historian attempting to recreate a period in time from documented original sources and informed speculation. Dunn also sometimes takes on the perspective of a biographer, drawing from the sparse personal information provided by Ibn Battuta and others in an attempt to paint a picture of the world traveler. Here again he must temper his biographical conclusions with critical skepticism, as Ibn Battuta says very little about himself or his personal life, especially regarding women. Much of what Dunn is able to tell his readers is reconstructed from what is known about other men of the time of similar background.