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An Evening with Turkish Writer Ece Temelkuran

Date
Monday, May 14, 2018, 7:00pm - 8:30pm
Event Sponsor
Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies, Humanities Center, Comparative Literature, Division of Literatures, Cultures, and Languages, CDDRL, Mediterranean Studies Forum
Location
Stanford Humanities Center, Levinthal Hall
An Evening with Turkish Writer Ece Temelkuran

A conversation with Ece Temelkuran, one of Turkey’s best-known novelists and political commentators and author of the novel, The Time of Mute Swans, and non-fiction work, Turkey: The Insane and the Melancholy.

Temelkuran was one of the most read political columnists in Turkey until her investigative and critical journalism on Turkish government and, especially its handling of Roboski airstrike in 2011 led to her dismissal. She was a visiting fellow at Oxford and delivered the Freedom Lecture as a guest of Amnesty International and the Prince Claus Foundation. She has contributed articles to the New York Times and the Guardian. Her books have been published in nineteen countries. She lives in Istanbul and Zagreb. 

Reviews for The Time of Mute Swans:

"[The Time of Mute Swans] moves skillfully between history and fiction. . . . Set in Ankara in the tense summer leading up to the Turkish coup of 1980, this novel centers on two children . . . who contend with the strife of the adult world. . . . The end of [their] innocence is vividly evoked.”—The New Yorker

"Street battles, kidnapping, torture, fascists, communists, rocky marriages, and class tensions—and most of it seen through the eyes of two eight-year-old children living in Ankara."—The New York Times Book Review

"This novel creates a lump in your throat when you can't decide whether to laugh or cry."—Diken (Turkey) 

"A poetic and at the same time political novel whose naïve-realistic narration captivates."— Der Bund (Germany)

 

Reviews for Turkey: The Insane and the Melancholy

"A masterclass in expecting the unexpected."—Financial Times

"Temelkuran looks on in despair at the state of the country as everything she warned about comes to pass. . . . This new book gives a representative example of what an intelligent observer in Turkey thinks and feels about the past fifteen years."Times Literary Supplement

"As one of Turkey’s leading journalists and activists, Temelkuran offers a vivid portrait of a nation in constant turmoil. . . . The Insane and the Melancholy will help you to understand Turkey better. Here is a book that should definitely be on the reading list of everyone who is sincerely interested in this troubled country and its beautiful, often confused, always lonely people."—Spectator

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