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Birds Without Wings
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Birds Without Wings |
This book was sold everywhere in Istanbul, but paying €30 for a paperback seemed ridiculous, so I bought it here. The plot isn't terribly intricate and the characters are only briefly sketched, but the story is decent. It also serves as a basic introduction to the Ottoman collapse and subsequent birth of modern Turkey (for those who find actual history icky).
Birds Without Wings juxtaposes the life of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk with that of a tiny Lycian coast village and its inhabitants. The villagers are Christian and Muslim peasants who live side by side in relative peace, intermarry and even partake in each other's religious rituals. Eventually, global events detailed in the Atatürk chapters begin to have an impact on this idyllic village. Armenians are killed, Muslim boys go off to war (and are subsequently traumatized), Christians are deported and bandits overrun the countryside. The main love story, involving a Muslim boy and a Christian girl who have been besotted with each other since birth, obviously ends in tragedy.
It was a bit boring and predictable seeing these characters caught in the maelstrom of WWI, but some of the scenes (e.g. one villager's experience at Gallipoli) were quite vivid and captivating. There were also a few tedious passages where the narrator summarized historical events and lectured against religious/nationalist movements. I thought this level of exposition was unnecessary for such a simple story.
Basically, Birds Without Wings is a MENA "beach read". Comical, whimsical, not too complicated and makes an obvious point about the bloodiness of religious intolerance and nationalism. Not for people who enjoy reading Dostoyevsky in their spare time.
Posted by eerie at August 20, 2007 11:57 AM
Filed Under: Fiction
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Comments
I think your review is coming at the book from a perspective too informed about the history of the region. Most Westerners do not, in fact, know much about the Ottoman Empire or the mixture of people who lived in it.
Gallipoli is known by some--Aussies, the British and military historians--but not so much by Americans, despite Mel Gibson's acting. Nor are most familiar with how Islam, Christianity, and Judaism co-existed at varying level of tolerance. The Turkish take on Armenians, very well covered in the book I think, is also noteworthy.
Posted by: John Burgess at September 22, 2007 01:38 PM
