ISTANBUL MEMORIES AND THE CITY PB B FORMAT

WINNER OF THE NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE Istanbul, through the mind of its most celebrated writer. A declaration of love. Sunday Times Magnificent, elegiac, impressionistic. Literary Review An irresistibly seductive book. Jan Morris, Guardian In a surprising and original blend of personal memoir and cultural history, Turkeys most celebrated novelist, Orhan Pamuk, explores his home of more than fifty years. What begins as a portrait of the artist as a young man becomes a shimmering evocation, by turns intimate and panoramic, of one of the worlds greatest cities. Beginning in the family apartment building where he was born, and still lives, Pamuk uses his family secrets to show how they were typical of their time and place. He then guides us through Istanbuls monuments and lost paradises, dilapidated Ottoman villas, back streets and waterways, and introduces us to the citys writers, artists and murderers. Like Joyces Dublin and Borges Buenos Aires, Pamuks Istanbul is a triumphant encounter of place and sensibility, beautifully written and immensely moving. This erudite book manages to be an addictive childhood memoir, a museum-in-prose of a city with West in its head but East in its soul, a study of the alchemy between place and self. David Mitchell