Istanbul: Memories of a City - Softcover

Pamuk, Orhan

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0571218334 ISBN 13: 9780571218332

Publisher: Faber & Faber, 2006

Synopsis

Istanbul is a shimmering evocation, by turns intimate and panoramic, of one of the world's great cities, by its foremost writer. Orhan Pamuk, winner of the Nobel Prize in 2006, was born in Istanbul, in the family apartment building where his mother first held him in her arms. His portrait of his city is thus also a self-portrait, refracted by memory and the melancholy-or hüzün- that all Istanbullus share: the sadness that comes of living amid the ruins of a lost Ottoman Empire.

As he companionably guides us across the Bosphorus, through Istanbul's historical monuments and lost paradises, its dilapidated Ottoman villas, back streets and waterways, he also introduces us to the city's writers, artists and murderers.

Like the Dublin of Joyce and Jan Morris' Venice, Pamuk's Istanbul is a triumphant encounter of place and sensibility, beautifully written and immensely moving.

About this title

Review:

"'This evocative book succeeds at both its tasks. It is one of the most touching childhood memoirs I have read in a very long time; and it makes me yearn - more than any glossy tourist brochure could possibly do - to be once again in Istanbul.' Noel Malcom, Sunday Telegraph 'An extraordinary and transcendentally beautiful book... It is a long time since I have read a book of such crystalline originality, or one that moved me so much.' Katie Hickman"

Book Description:

Istanbul by Orhan Pamuk, Turkey's winner of the Nobel Prize and author of My Name is Red, is the perfect guide to his home city, Istanbul.

About this edition

• Publisher: Faber & Faber
• Publication date: 2006
• ISBN 10: 0571218334
• ISBN 13: 9780571218332
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 348