An Istanbul Anthology: Travel Writing through the Centuries

Middle East Travel Anthologies

by Kaya Genç (Editor), Giacomo Casanova, Gérard de Nerval

For centuries following its reestablishment as Constantinople in AD 330, Istanbul served as the capital of three great empires: Roman, Byzantine, and Ottoman. The city's maze-like streets and high balconies, its steep alleys, flower gardens, and forested hillsides remain soaked in the vestiges of that imperial past, and it is to that past and to Istanbul's unearthly moods and waters that so many writers and diarists journeyed in search of escape, knowledge, happiness, or sheer wonderment. An Istanbul Anthology takes us on a nostalgic journey through the city with travelers' accounts of the sights, smells, and sounds of Istanbul's bazaars and coffeehouses, its grand palaces and gardens, crumbling buildings, and ancient churches and mosques, and the waters that so haunt and define it. With writers such as Gustave Flaubert, Pierre Loti, Ernest Hemingway, Mark Twain, and Andre Gide, we discover and rediscover the many delights of this great city of antiquity, meeting point of East and West, and gateway to peoples and civilizations.
About the series: The elegant, pocket-sized volumes in the AUC Press Anthology series feature the writings and observations of travel writers and diarists through the centuries. Vivid and evocative travelers' accounts of some of the world's great cities and regions are enhanced by the exquisite vintage design in small hardback format that make the books ideal gift books as well as perfect travel companions. Designed on cream paper stock and beautifully illustrated with line drawings and archival photographs."

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Travel

160 pages, Hardcover

First published October 30, 2015

About the author

Kaya Genç is the author of three books from Bloomsbury Publishing: The Lion and the Nightingale (2019), Under the Shadow (2016) and An Istanbul Anthology (2015). The Economist called Under the Shadow a ‘refreshingly balanced’ book whose author ‘has announced himself as a voice to be listened to’. The Los Angeles Review of Books described An Istanbul Anthology as ‘a compellingly real picture of the city’. Kaya has contributed to the world’s leading journals and newspapers, including two front page stories in The New York Times, cover stories in The New York Review of Books, Foreign Affairs and The Times Literary Supplement, and essays and articles in The New Yorker, The Nation, The Paris Review, The Guardian, The Financial Times, The New Statesman, The New Republic, Time, Newsweek and The London Review of Books. The Atlantic picked Kaya’s writings for the magazine’s ‘best works of journalism in 2014’ list. A critic for Artforum and Art in America, and a contributing editor at Index on Censorship, Kaya gave lectures at venues including the Royal Anthropological Institute, and appeared live on flagship programmes including the Leonard Lopate Show on WNYC and BBC’s Start the Week. He is the Istanbul correspondent of the Los Angeles Review of Books. Kaya has been a speaker at Edinburgh, Jaipur and Ways With Words book festivals, and he holds a Ph.D. in English Literature.

Reviews

[Evin Ashley · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very quick read; an utter delight to wake up with in the morning in the city it describes.

Even though Kaya Genç's collection of travel writings are entirely Western-authored and reek of a Romanticism bordering on Orientalism, they are true. They are true because they are the perspectives of Westerners coming to the fringe of the East, and communicated in a way that they understand. I also admired Genç's decision to end the collection with "The City As Hell", noting "Not all its visitors loved Istanbul, but even those who hated it expressed their feelings in a way that seems to take inspiration from the city's rich and elaborate character." That's a real test of admiration, perhaps even love - to see the obscenity and yet still be provoked and inspired by the whole.

Two passages I enjoyed in particular:

"I also like to think that there may be some people in the world for whom time is more than money. At any rate, it pleases me that all the people in the world are not the same. It pleases me that some are content to sit in coffee-houses, to enjoy simple pleasures, to watch common spectacles, to find that in life which every one may possess - light, growing things, the movement of water, and an outlook on the ways of men." (p.113)

"Came riding on his splendid Arab horse the young 'nineteen-year-old' Sultan Abdul Medjid. He wore a green coat buttoned across the chest, and wore no ornament, except one great jewel with which the bird of Paradise feather was fastened in his red fez cap. He looked very pale and thin, had melancholy features, and fixed his dark eyes firmly on the spectators, especially on the Franks. We took off our hats and bowed; the soldiers shouted out, 'Long live the Emperor!' but he made not a gesture in acknowledgement of our salutes.

'Why does he not notice our salutes?' I inquired of a young Turk at my side. 'He must have seen that we took off our hats.'

'He looked at you,' replied the Turk; 'he looked at you very closely.'" (p.45)

[Vivek · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book takes you back in time and makes a lovely easy read for someone familiar with Istanbul. The past comes alive and you get snippets of interesting anecdotes on places you would have been. Its like a time capsule in pithy bits from famous personalities from the Western world. Recommended for anyone living in Istanbul - but read it after a year of living in the city