What do you think?
Rate this book
Following Footsteps
One way to understand a place is to follow the life of someone who left a mark on it.
Following Footsteps explores twenty destinations through twenty people connected to their history. Moving from Genoa and Paris to Palermo and the American West, journalist and author Remzi Gökdağ looks at the past from the streets of the present, tracing what people leave behind in places and what those places leave in them.
Artists, travelers, writers, photographers, scientists, and musicians become guides to the cities where they lived or worked. In Amsterdam, the story follows Rembrandt; in Pamplona, Hemingway; in Bern, Einstein. Prague recalls its alchemists, Berlin carries the marks of repeated reinvention, and Los Alamos preserves the secrecy and consequences of the atomic age.
Some of these places still live by their old reputations. Others carry their history less visibly, in buildings, streets, and the routines of daily life. Bringing travel, biography, and cultural history together, Following Footsteps examines twenty places through the lives that changed how we see them.
Following Footsteps explores twenty destinations through twenty people connected to their history. Moving from Genoa and Paris to Palermo and the American West, journalist and author Remzi Gökdağ looks at the past from the streets of the present, tracing what people leave behind in places and what those places leave in them.
Artists, travelers, writers, photographers, scientists, and musicians become guides to the cities where they lived or worked. In Amsterdam, the story follows Rembrandt; in Pamplona, Hemingway; in Bern, Einstein. Prague recalls its alchemists, Berlin carries the marks of repeated reinvention, and Los Alamos preserves the secrecy and consequences of the atomic age.
Some of these places still live by their old reputations. Others carry their history less visibly, in buildings, streets, and the routines of daily life. Bringing travel, biography, and cultural history together, Following Footsteps examines twenty places through the lives that changed how we see them.
162 pages, Kindle Edition
First published September 13, 2019
About the author
Remzi Gökdağ
4 books1 followerRemzi Gökdağ is an Istanbul-born journalist, author, and documentary photographer. His work explores cities, memory, history, and the lives unfolding behind their visible surfaces.
Born in 1968, Gökdağ studied journalism at Istanbul University and began his career as a reporter for Cumhuriyet in 1989. Much of his early reporting focused on Istanbul: its changing urban landscape, its people, and the tensions between development and everyday life. His coverage of major urban controversies, including the Park Hotel project, received journalism awards in the early 1990s.
His career later took him beyond Turkey. He worked as a Moscow correspondent for Kanal D and Radikal, reported for Cumhuriyet from Los Angeles, and became editor-in-chief of California Turkish Times in 2005. He later continued his journalistic work from Zurich and Dubai.
The same curiosity runs through his books. Drawing on reporting, travel, observation, and archival research, he writes about the ways cities change and the traces people leave behind. His books include Park Otel Olayı (1992), Amerikan Medyasında 11 Eylül (2001), Sevgili İstanbul (2015), and Başka Şehirler (2019). English editions of Sevgili İstanbul and Başka Şehirler were published in 2025 under the titles Dear Istanbul and Following Footsteps.
Instagram: @remgok
Born in 1968, Gökdağ studied journalism at Istanbul University and began his career as a reporter for Cumhuriyet in 1989. Much of his early reporting focused on Istanbul: its changing urban landscape, its people, and the tensions between development and everyday life. His coverage of major urban controversies, including the Park Hotel project, received journalism awards in the early 1990s.
His career later took him beyond Turkey. He worked as a Moscow correspondent for Kanal D and Radikal, reported for Cumhuriyet from Los Angeles, and became editor-in-chief of California Turkish Times in 2005. He later continued his journalistic work from Zurich and Dubai.
The same curiosity runs through his books. Drawing on reporting, travel, observation, and archival research, he writes about the ways cities change and the traces people leave behind. His books include Park Otel Olayı (1992), Amerikan Medyasında 11 Eylül (2001), Sevgili İstanbul (2015), and Başka Şehirler (2019). English editions of Sevgili İstanbul and Başka Şehirler were published in 2025 under the titles Dear Istanbul and Following Footsteps.
Instagram: @remgok
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review
September 19, 2019
20 kenti, 20 ismin rehberliğinde gezen Remzi Gökdağ, okuru düşle gerçek arasında gizemli yolculuklara davet ediyor. Her şehre efsane bir isim rehberlik ediyor. Yolculuklar Alp Dağları’nın büyüleyici yamaçlarından ‘Vahşi Batı’nın çöllerine uzanıyor. Tarih sayfalarında kalan bazı olayları tekrar hatırlamamızı sağlayan kitap, aynı zamanda şehirlerin geçmişinde iz bırakan kişilerin yaşamlarından da kesitler sunuyor.
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review