John Ash was born in Manchester, England in 1948, the son of schoolteachers. With a brief break to attend the University of Birmingham and to take a post-graduation year in Cyprus, he remained in the city of his birth until 1985, at which time he moved to New York.

In New York, he became associated with the New York School of Poets and formed a strong and lasting friendship with its leading proponent, John Ashbery. After stints teaching at Iowa and Berkeley, in 1996 he moved to Istanbul, where he has lived since, teaching at Boğaziçi University, before moving to Kadir Has University.

During this time, several of his books, including Selected Works and To the City, have appeared in Turkish translation, published by Yapi Kredi Publications, affiliated with the bank of the same name. Deluxe editions of The Anitolikon, published in a side-by-side English and Turkish edition by Yapi Kredi, featured illustrations by Peter Hristoff, a noted Turkish artist of Bulgarian Christian origin living in New York.

In a review of To The City, Poetry, said John Ash "could be the best English poet of his generation". Most recently he was profiled in The Economist in an article by Hugh Pope, himself an author and formerly the Wall Street Journal correspondent in Istanbul. Pope has suggested that Ash is the leading light in a new "Istanbul School" of English-speaking poets taking their inspiration from the city.

Following Byzantine Journey, and other travel writing, Ash led tours relevant sites and in 2006 wrote the script for the documentary "Istanbul for Aficionados". He has also appeared on a BBC guide to Istanbul.

A high point of civilization and artistic accomplishment, the Byzantine Empire has also been the object of great misunderstanding and prejudice.

This is a portrayal of its cultural history, focusing on its surreal landscapes and fantastic monuments. The book starts in Istanbul and crosses the Sea of Marmara to travel through Anatolia, the region of Asiatic Turkey which was the source of the Empire's wealth and manpower.

John Ash finds his way through a country of anachronisms and contrasts, of bloody feuds and frescoed cave-churches, of saints and sinners, of emperors and sultans. The book introduces the reader to an exotic cast of characters, including the impassioned aesthete Theophilus, the great mystical poet Rumi, the bishop and necromancer Theodore Santabarenos and the Empress Theophano.