One of the most famous authors in Turkey back then, now living in London… The new novels are always in English and it takes a while until you have the Turkish translation, so I read this one in English. We chose it with our book club.
Throughout the book, what surprised me the most was the river Tigris. In Turkish, we call it Dicle, which is rather a girl’s name. On the other hand, Euphrates, which we call “Fırat,” is a boy’s name. In Turkish folk songs, you generally hear more about Euphrates: “Şu Fırat’ın suyu akar serindir oy.” So, as it was Tigris in English and it was very wild and causing lots of trouble in the book, it gave me more of a masculine energy, which contradicts its Turkish name.
The book also reminded me of a song called “Go to the River” by Yael Naim. Please listen to it carefully, paying attention to the lyrics, and you’ll get what I mean.
About the book itself, while the main story didn’t captivate me strongly, I appreciated the way Elif Şafak intertwined various horizon-widening narratives. Maybe calling it a main story is wrong, as there are three different stories inside which eventually cross each other’s paths. The book begins with Victorian Arthur’s mudlarking mother and how she gives birth to him. That part of the story was very interesting to me, as I had never heard of that “job” before and I could really imagine what it might have been like.
Having visited Hasankeyf before it was submerged, and having traveled through these lands, I never imagined them to be so rich and joyful. I’ve seen traces of the Assyrian Empire in numerous museums worldwide, starting with the Pergamon Museum, the Museum of Fine Arts in Budapest, and, as mentioned in the book, the British Museum. The vibrant color of “lapis lazuli” at the Ishtar Gate in the Pergamon Museum left a lasting impression on me.
I liked to read in the end -which figures in the real life inspired her to write this book. There I discovered actually the real Artur “George Smith” who lived in the Victorian era, was a self-taught expert in cuneiform and the first person to translate the Epic of Gilgamesh into English.
Elif Şafak has a talent for addressing untouchable or controversial topics as central themes in her works. Through this book, I learned a lot about Yazidi culture and their connection to the Assyrian Empire.
