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Pamuk, Orhan : Istanbul: Memories and the City

Faber & Faber, London, 2005

ISBN 0571227538

Translated by Maureen Freely. A portrait, by turns intimate and panoramic, of one of the world's great cities, by its foremost man of letters, author of the acclaimed novels "Snow and "My Name Is Red. Blending reminiscence with history; family photographs with portraits of poets and pashas; art criticism, metaphysical musing, and, now and again, a fanciful tale, Orhan Pamuk invents an ingenious form to evoke his lifelong home, the city that forged his imagination. He begins with his childhood among the eccentric extended Pamuk family in the dusty, carpeted, and hermetically sealed apartment building they shared. In this place came his first intimations of the melancholy awareness that binds all residents of his city together: that of living in the seat of ruined imperial glories, in a country trying to become "modern" at the dizzying crossroads of East and West. This elegiac communal spirit overhangs Pamuk's reflections as he introduces the writers and painters (among the latter, most particularly the German Antoine-Ignace Melling) through whose eyes he came to see Istanbul. Against a background of shattered monuments, neglected villas, ghostly backstreets, and, above all, the fabled waters of the Bosphorus, he presents the interplay of his budding sense of place with that of his predecessors. And he charts the evolution of a rich, sometimes macabre, imaginative life, which furnished a daydreaming boy refuge from family discord and inner turmoil, and which would continue to serve the famous writer he was to become. It was, and remains, a life fed by the changing microcosm of the apartment building and, even more, the beckoning kaleidoscope beyond its walls. As much a portrait of the artist as a young manas it is an oneiric Joycean map of the city, "Istanbul is a masterful evocation of its subject through the idiosyncrasies of direct experience as much as the power of myth--the dazzling book Pamuk was born to write. 348p. illus. index. Book. Book Condition: Near Fine. Binding: Trade Paperback

First Pbk.Ed..

Pamuk, Orhan (Translated by Maureen Freely) : Istanbul: Memories And The City

Alfred A. Knopf, New York City, NY, 2005

ISBN 1400040957

First Edition / First Printing. Fine in Fine Dust Jacket. 384 pages. The author's valentine-memoir on subject. One of Orhan Pamuk's finest achievements. The first appearance of the title in the United States. Precedes and should not be confused with all other subsequent editions. Published in a small and limited first print run as a hardcover original only. The First Edition is now scarce. Presents Orhan Pamuk's "Istanbul: Memories And The City" in a felicitous English translation. An evocative portrait of a great and storied city, an elegy for a bygone civilization, and a meditation on the "complicated intimacies" (Pamuk's phrase) of life itself. "Spins a masterful tale, moving from his fractured extended family, all living in a communal apartment building, out into the city and encompassing the entire Ottoman Empire. Pamuk sees the slow collapse of the once powerful empire hanging like a pall over the city and its citizens. Central to many Istanbul residents' character is the concept of huzun ('melancholy'). Istanbul's huzun, Pamuk writes, 'is a way of looking at life that is ultimately as life-affirming as it is negating'. A powerful, disturbing literary journey through the soul of a great city, told by one of its great writers" (Publishers Weekly). "In the quest for the melancholic soul of his native city, he has discovered new symbols for the clash and interlacing of cultures. He has enlarged the roots of the contemporary novel through his links to both Western and Eastern culture. This means that he has stolen the novel, one can say, from us Westerners, and has transformed it into something different from what we have ever seen before" (Horace Engdahl, Nobel Prize Committee). An absolute "must-have" title for Orhan Pamuk collectors. This copy is very boldly and beautifully signed and dated in black pen-marker on the title page by the author: "2010 Orhan Pamuk". It is signed directly on the page itself, not on a tipped-in page. Pamuk's signature on this copy is spectacular, the most beautiful signed copy of this book we have ever seen. This title is a contemporary classic. This is one of few such signed and dated copies of the First American Edition/First Printing still available online and is in especially fine condition: Clean, crisp, and bright, a pristine beauty. Please note: Signed copies of Pamuk's books are scarce and as such, have always been collectible. Copies available online have serious flaws or are subsequent printings. This is surely an accessible and lovely alternative. A rare signed copy thus. Winner of the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award in 2003 for "My Name Is Red". Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2006, the first Turkish writer to be so deservedly honored. One of the greatest writers of our time. A fine collectible copy. (SEE ALSO OTHER ORHAN PAMUK TITLES IN OUR CATALOG). ISBN 1400040957.

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Pamuk, Orhan (Translated by Maureen Freely) : Istanbul: Memories And The City

Alfred A. Knopf, New York City, NY, 2005

ISBN 1400040957

First Edition / First Printing. Fine in Fine Dust Jacket. 384 pages. The author's valentine-memoir on subject. One of Orhan Pamuk's finest achievements. The first appearance of the title in the United States. Precedes and should not be confused with all other subsequent editions. Published in a small and limited first print run as a hardcover original only. The First Edition is now scarce. Presents Orhan Pamuk's "Istanbul: Memories And The City" in a felicitous English translation. An evocative portrait of a great and storied city, an elegy for a bygone civilization, and a meditation on the "complicated intimacies" (Pamuk's phrase) of life itself. "Spins a masterful tale, moving from his fractured extended family, all living in a communal apartment building, out into the city and encompassing the entire Ottoman Empire. Pamuk sees the slow collapse of the once powerful empire hanging like a pall over the city and its citizens. Central to many Istanbul residents' character is the concept of huzun ('melancholy'). Istanbul's huzun, Pamuk writes, 'is a way of looking at life that is ultimately as life-affirming as it is negating'. A powerful, disturbing literary journey through the soul of a great city, told by one of its great writers" (Publishers Weekly). "In the quest for the melancholic soul of his native city, he has discovered new symbols for the clash and interlacing of cultures. He has enlarged the roots of the contemporary novel through his links to both Western and Eastern culture. This means that he has stolen the novel, one can say, from us Westerners, and has transformed it into something different from what we have ever seen before" (Horace Engdahl, Nobel Prize Committee). An absolute "must-have" title for Orhan Pamuk collectors. This copy is very boldly and beautifully signed and dated in blue ink-pen on the title page by the author: "2018 Orhan Pamuk". It is signed directly on the page itself, not on a tipped-in page. Pamuk's signature on this copy is fabulous, one of the most beautiful we have ever seen. This title is a contemporary classic. This is one of few such signed and dated copies of the First American Edition/First Printing still available online and is in especially fine condition: Clean, crisp, and bright, a pristine beauty. Please note: Signed copies of Pamuk's books are scarce and as such, have always been collectible. Copies available online have serious flaws or are subsequent printings. This is surely an accessible and lovely alternative. A rare signed copy thus. Winner of the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award in 2003 for "My Name Is Red". Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2006, the first Turkish writer to be so deservedly honored. One of the greatest writers of our time. A fine collectible copy. (SEE ALSO OTHER ORHAN PAMUK TITLES IN OUR CATALOG). ISBN 1400040957.

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