The Delights of Turkey: Twenty Tales

by Edouard Roditi

Edouard Roditi’s The Delights of Turkey is a confection that reminds us that short fiction need not be only a relentless probing of everyday anguish. Here is a score of witty and ingenious stories, set for the most part in Asia Minor, where the centuries-long mingling of Turks and Armenians, Greeks and Jews has evolved a vibrant culture rich in diversity. The tales are often bawdy or fanciful in the manner of the Thousand and One Nights, while others are more poignantly humorous in style, as we meet pasha, princess, and peasant, become privy to the intrigues of the Ottoman harem, or follow the merchant caravans on their journeys east. The collection itself is arranged thematically in four parts. “A City Built on Seven Hills” sketches a timeless Istanbul. “The Chronicles of Bok Köy” tell of an Anatolian village and the legendary prowess of its young men, the redoubtable Achmet Hodja most especially. In “Orient Express” baffled European meets mysterious Levantine. The last section, “The Eternal and Ubiquitous City” returns once more to Istanbul, this time in its contemporary guise.

184 pages, Paperback

Published November 1, 1977

About the author

Poet, essayist, and translator Edouard Roditi was born (1910) in Paris to American parents. He studied at Oxford University and earned his BA from the University of Chicago. An art critic for the French journal L’Arche for roughly 30 years, Roditi was closely associated with the Surrealist movement, and he was the first to translate the writings of the French surrealist Andre Breton into English. He lived most of his life in Paris, though he spent time in the United States and worked as a translator at the Nuremberg war crimes trials. He died in Spain in 1992.

Reviews

[Kaya Tokmakçıoğlu · Rating 3 out of 5]

Konstantiniyyeli bir büyükbaba ve babanın oğlu Roditi; öyküleri ağırlıklı olarak modernleşme sürecine girmiş ve yıkılmaya yüz tutmuş Osmanlı'nın son dönemlerine odaklanıyor. Yer yer masal dilinden, kimi zaman da sözlü anlatı geleneğinden faydalanarak Sultan'da cisimleşen iktidarın parodisini yapıyor. Bazı öykülerdeki oryantalist bakış açısı rahatsız edici olsa da, 19. yy.'ın son yıllarının İstanbul'una 20. yy. ortalarından bir bakış için okumaya değer.

[Hakan Öztürk · Rating 4 out of 5]

ihsan oktay anar tadı ararken aradığımı az da olsa bulduğum hikayeler silsilesi. hatta bu hikayelerdeki hayal gücü ve cinsel cüretkarlık (özellikle kitab ül hiyel de tebarüz eden cüretkarlıktan bahsediyorum) üstüne büyülü gerçekçilik sosu ve lisanı osmani eklenince ihsan oktay anar çıkıyor diyebilirim. sanki üstat bu hikayeleri okumuş gibi bir his var içimde.

en çok bokköy hikayelerini sevdim, fazla oryantalist, edepsiz hatta ofansif bulanlar çıkabilir bu hikayeleri. ortamlarda mevcut.