Turkey Book Talk #199 – James Meyer, associate professor of Islamic World History at Montana State University, on “Red Star over the Black Sea: Nazım Hikmet and His Generation” (Oxford University Press).
The book is a new biography of the great 20th century poet Nazım Hikmet (1902-1963). It draws deeply on previously untapped archival sources from Moscow, Istanbul, Amsterdam and Washington, situating him within a broader generation of border-crossing Turkish communists.
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Read excerpts from Chapter 11 of the book.
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Turkey Book Talk #193 – Aron Aji discusses the life and work of Turkish author Ferit Edgü
Aji’s translations of Edgü’s excellent, austere novellas “The Wounded Age” and “Eastern Tales” were recently published in a new single volume by New York Review Books.
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Turkey Book Talk #190 – Maureen Freely on the life and work of the late Tezer Özlü.
Her translation of Özlü’s 1980 novel “Cold Nights of Childhood” has just been published for the first time in English by Serpent’s Tail.
First published in 1980, the book follows a narrator whose life closely mirrors Özlü’s own, growing up in Istanbul before periods in Berlin and Paris, unhappy marriages, and tortuous stays in psychiatric institutions. Despite being set against the backdrop of a uniquely turbulent era in Turkey’s modern history, the book is also characterised by its sexual frankness and political ambivalence.
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Turkey Book Talk episode 170 – Amy Marie Spangler on the great author Leyla Erbil (1931-2013) and her novel “A Strange Woman“. Spangler just co-translated a new English edition of the book, published by Deep Vellum, building on an original translation by Nermin Menemencioğlu.
First published in 1971, “A Strange Woman” weaves together the story of a young woman entering adulthood in Istanbul of the 1960s and 70s with vignettes from modern Turkish history, as well as reflections on class divides and the ambiguous position of intellectuals in society.
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Also check out Amy’s previous appearance on the podcast from July 2018.
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Become a member on Patreon to support Turkey Book Talk. Members get a 35% discount on all Turkey/Ottoman History books published by IB Tauris/Bloomsbury, transcripts of every interview, transcripts of the whole archive, links to related content upon publication of each episode, and over 200 book reviews covering Turkish and international fiction, history and politics.
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Maureen Freely on rediscovering leftist Turkish novelist Suat Derviş
November 23, 2021
Turkey Book Talk episode 155 – Maureen Freely discusses the eventful life of leftist woman novelist Suat Derviş (1904-1972), as well as her recently published translation of Derviş’s “In the Shadow of the Yalı” (Other Press).
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Maureen Freely’s previous appearances on Turkey Book Talk:
Episode 18 – On Sabahattin Ali and translating ‘Madonna in a Fur Coat’
Episode 86 – On the life and work of Sait Faik Abasiyanik
Become a member on Patreon to support Turkey Book Talk. Members get a 30% discount on all Turkey/Ottoman History books published by IB Tauris/Bloomsbury, transcripts of every interview, transcripts of the whole archive, and over 200 reviews covering Turkish and international fiction, history and politics.
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Turkey Book Talk episode #138 – Jenny White, professor at Stockholm University’s Institute for Turkish Studies, on “Turkish Kaleidoscope: Fractured Lives in a Time of Violence” (Princeton University Press).
The graphic novel, illustrated by Ergün Gündüz, tells the story of four young protagonists caught up in the social and political turbulence leading to Turkey’s 1980 military coup.
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Here’s a link to the Spotify playlist specially crafted to complement the book, featuring popular songs from the era.
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Support Turkey Book Talk by becoming a member. Members get extras including exclusive access to a 30% discount on all Turkey/Ottoman history books published by IB Tauris/Bloomsbury, English and Turkish transcripts of every interview upon publication, transcripts of the entire archive of episodes, and an archive of 231 reviews covering Turkish and international fiction, history, journalism and politics.
Turkey Book Talk episode #119 – Magdalena Zaborowska, professor of literature at the University of Michigan, on her book “James Baldwin’s Turkish Decade: Erotics of Exile” (Duke University Press)
The book looks at the great African American author’s extensive periods living and working in Istanbul from 1961 to 1971.
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Check out Raziye Akkoç and Diego Cupolo’s excellent Turkey Recap weekly newsletter
Become a member to support Turkey Book Talk and get loads of extras: A 35% discount on any of over 100 books in IB Tauris/Bloomsbury’s excellent Turkey/Ottoman history category, English and Turkish transcripts of every interview upon publication, transcripts of the entire archive of episodes, and an archive of 231 reviews written by myself covering Turkish and international fiction, history, journalism and politics.
Turkey Book Talk episode #100 – Holly Shissler, associate professor of Ottoman and Modern Turkish History at the University of Chicago, on the life and work of Ahmet Mithat Efendi (1844-1912).
Ahmet Mithat is among the most important men of letters in the late Ottoman era. The publisher of the newspaper Tercuman-i Hakikat, he was also the author of many fictional works including Felatun Bey and Rakim Efendi, which appeared in an English translation from Syracuse University Press in 2016, and which Shissler wrote an afterword for.
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Become a member to support Turkey Book Talk and get a load of extras: A 35% discount on any of over 400 books in IB Tauris/Bloomsbury’s excellent Turkey/Ottoman history category, English and Turkish transcripts of every interview upon publication, transcripts of the entire archive of episodes, and an archive of 231 reviews written by myself covering Turkish and international fiction, history, journalism and politics.
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Turkey Book Talk episode #95 – Mehmet Fatih Uslu, faculty member in the Turkish Language and Literature Department at Istanbul Şehir University, on the pleasures and challenges of translating from Armenian into Turkish.
Uslu has translated a number of significant texts in recent years, including by the great early 20th century Istanbul Armenian feminist Zabel Yesayan and the 19th century playwright Hagop Baronyan.
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Become a member to support Turkey Book Talk and get a load of extras: A 35% discount on any of over 400 books in IB Tauris/Bloomsbury’s excellent Turkey/Ottoman history category, English and Turkish transcripts of every interview upon publication, transcripts of the entire archive of 90+ episodes, and an archive of 231 reviews written by myself covering Turkish and international fiction, history, journalism and politics.
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Maureen Freely on the life and work of Sait Faik Abasiyanik
January 29, 2019
Turkey Book Talk episode #82 – Maureen Freely on the enduring appeal of Sait Faik Abasiyanik (1906-1954), perhaps Turkey’s greatest short story writer.
Freely co-translated, with Alexander Dawe, a selection of Sait Faik’s stories, published in English as “A Useless Man” (Archipelago).
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I’m delighted to announce that IB Tauris/Bloomsbury have agreed to renew the exclusive discount for Turkey Book Talk members. Join as a member to get access to a 35% discount on any of over 400 books in IB Tauris’ excellent Turkey/Ottoman history category.
Members also get (English and Turkish) transcripts of every interview, transcripts of the entire archive, and an archive of 231 reviews written by myself covering Turkish and international fiction, history, journalism and politics.
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Lora Sarı on the life, photography and writing of Ara Güler
December 11, 2018
Turkey Book Talk episode #79 – Lora Sarı talks about the life and work of the late great Ara Güler.
Lora is an editor at Aras, an Armenian-focused publishing house that recently published “We Will Live After Babylon”, a collection of Güler’s largely fictional writings, penned mostly in the 1940s and 50s before he started taking photographs.
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Also check out a previous episode with Lora Sarı talking about Mıgırdıç Margosyan’s “Infidel Quarter” and the broader work of Aras.
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Join as a member to support Turkey Book Talk and get (English and Turkish) transcripts of every interview, transcripts of the entire archive, access to a 30% discount on over 200 Turkey/Ottoman history titles published by IB Tauris, and an archive of 231 reviews written by myself covering Turkish and international fiction, history, journalism and politics.
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Turkey Book Talk episode #69 – Amy Spangler on the life and work of Sevgi Soysal, whose classic 1973 novel “Noontime in Yenişehir” she translated into English. She also discusses co-founding the literary agency AnatoliaLit and her work on “Seher,” a collection of stories penned in jail by former HDP co-chair Selahattin Demirtaş.
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Here’s my review of the (great) novel from a few weeks ago.
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Support Turkey Book Talk by becoming a member. Membership gives you full transcripts in English and Turkish of every interview upon publication, transcripts of the entire Turkey Book Talk archive (over 60 conversations so far), and access to an exclusive 30% discount on over 200 Turkey/Ottoman History titles published by IB Tauris.
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