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Saturday, 30 April 2016

Stamboul Sketches, John Freely

A reread of a classic book on Istanbul from another time.  Always a pleasure to read the little gems of a now mostly disappeared Istanbul, and its people and social customs.  Similar wistful swan song to the books of Orhan Pamuk.  It has suffered the same losses as we in the west - breakdown of daily community ties, loss of the individual and growing social conformity, obsession with material goods as a definition of a life, loss of connection with the natural setting in which we live.  Freely actually explores a broader spectrum of loss than Pamuk, who focuses more on relations and physical environment.

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