Turkey: the insane and the melancholy PDF
Preview Turkey: the insane and the melancholy
MORE PRAISE FOR TURKEY: THE INSANE AND THE MELANCHOLY “What a brave woman! And what a fine, stylish and intelligent writer! Mixing sarcasm, anger, wit, and irony as well as hard facts, Ece Temelkuran has provided us with an informative and moving account of Turkey’s seemingly inexorable drift into authoritarianism.” Donald Sassoon, author of The Culture of the Europeans “Part guide, part confidante, Ece Temelkuran brilliantly captures the neurosis at the heart of her country. An important book for anyone who wants to understand modern Turkey.” Padraig Reidy, editor of Little Atoms ABOUT THE AUTHOR Ece Temelkuran is one of Turkey’s best-known authors and political commentators. She was previously a columnist for the Milliyet newspaper, before her outspoken criticism of govern- ment repression led to her losing her job. Her previous books in English include Deep Mountain: Across the Turkish–Armenian Divide (2010) and the poetry collection Book of the Edge (2010). Ece has lived in Tunisia, Lebanon, Paris and Oxford to write her novels, which are published in several languages, and now divides her time between Istanbul and Zagreb. T U R K E Y T H E I N S A N E A N D T H E M E L A N C H O LY ECE TEMELKURAN TRANSLATED BY ZEYNEP BELER Zed Books LONDON Turkey: The Insane and the Melancholy was first published in English in 2016 by Zed Books Ltd, The Foundry, 17 Oval Way, London SE11 5RR, UK. www.zedbooks.net © Ece Temelkuran, 2015 © Kalem Agency, 2015 The right of Ece Temelkuran to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. Typeset in Haarlemmer by seagulls.net Index by John Barker Cover design by Clare Turner All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior permission of Zed Books Ltd. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN 978-1-78360-890-4 hb ISBN 978-1-78360-889-8 pb ISBN 978-1-78360-892-8 pdf ISBN 978-1-78360-891-1 epub ISBN 978-1-78360-893-5 mobi To the young people who died in the recent struggles, whose coffins were heavier than their bodies. C O N T E N T S INTRODUCTION 1 Yesterday 3 Today 8 Tomorrow 18 YESTERDAY 27 The origins of forgetting 31 How is indifference learned? 35 Orphans, fathers and resentment 40 “Such a generation we shall raise …” 42 Fascism or downright vengeance? 48 Turkey’s disorganised photo album 55 TODAY/MORNING 125 A woman’s “unindictable” murder 128 “Us” and “them” 141 The hour of “Long live our Padishah!” 154 The bloodiest front in social projects 171 A split-meaning, split-screen way of watching: 180 news hour in Turkey Goddamn it! 191 The grey daubs of the city: proving presence through 200 absence The mesmerising vulgarity 209 Children of the “zero problem” policy: the expedient 222 and inexpedient The meatballs of “the people” beat Macbeth to death 237 Opposite meanings of the peace sign: Kurds and Turks 247 Official memory versus actual memory 260 TOMORROW: “WHAT WILL BECOME OF 269 THIS BRIDGE OF OURS?” Appetite and hope 276 Down! Down! Down! Down! 277 Women and children first! 279 Middle Easternisation and the question “Should we go?” 281 The “safety valve” that cannot be located 282 Broken bridges, new bridges 282 Index 284 I N T R O D U C T I O N
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