The Baburnama: Memoirs of Babur, Prince and Emporer

This made me realize how much war has gone on in Afghanistan for centuries! I am not into war memoirs which is mostly what this is about (with some descriptions of animals, fruit, etc.)

It didn't really float my boat, and I have to admit that I read a version that was edited by the author (because I couldn't find it in any library, and I did not want to have to buy this book).

Meh. 

Here is why James Mustich thinks it should be one of the 1000 Books You Read Before You Die:

James Mustich

Astonishingly, given its sophistication in both style and substance, the Baburnama was the first real autobiography in Islamic literature: With no literary precedent, and, as it were, between battles, Babur created a form and discovered a self within it. The result makes absorbing reading, presenting an engrossing account of the emperor’s adventures as warrior and potentate; it is filled with evocative attentions to the natural world as well, and with glimpses of the gifts of expression that inspired the emperor’s poetry (he was a man of many parts). The memoirs of this multifaceted Mughal remain intriguing reading as—all at once—personal narrative, historical chronicle, literary landmark, and enduring cultural artifact.