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This book provides an annotated translation of memoirs of Ottoman eye-witness actors of the Great War in the Arab lands. It reflects on numerous crises of the Middle East today such as the ambiguous Arab¿Turkish relations, the Arab¿Israeli confrontation, and the struggle for the holy places of Islam.
List of contents
AcknowledgmentsIntroduction. Aspects of the Ottoman Twilight
Chapter 1. Falih R¿fk¿ Atay
Chapter 2. Hüseyin Kaz¿m Kadrí
Chapter 3. Ali Fuad Erden
Chapter 4. Münevver Ayäl¿
Chapter 5. Naci Käif K¿c¿man
Conclusion. The Atrak and the Arabs
Bibliography
About the author
Currently at the Lebanese American University, Selim Deringil was a professor at the Bosphorus University and a visiting professor in the United States, France, Japan and Hungary. His numerous publications include The Well Protected Domains and Conversion and Apostasy in the Late Ottoman Empire, both of which won the Turkish Studies Association Koprulu Prize.
Summary
The Great War is still seen as a mostly European war. The Middle Eastern theatre is, at best, considered a sideshow written from the western perspective. This book fills a gap in the literature by giving an insight through annotated translations from Ottoman memoirs of actors who witnessed the last few years of Turkish presence in the Arab lands.
Additional text
“The
Ottoman Twilight in the Arab Lands presents five interesting memoirs of exceptional
characters and comes in a perfect time where academia and research has been
interested more often in the contemporary of Arab-Turkish relation and history.
The chosen memoirs represent the post-Ottoman history which was published
during the early stages of the Kemalist Republic of Turkey. Although the
personality of Jamal Pasha has been central to all pages of all memoirs, they
covered other issues, most importantly, the Ottoman military and rule in the
Arab lands, executions of the Arab nationalists, politics of governing the
Arabs, minorities, and military. … [It is] a good source for researchers of the
history of the Ottomans in the Arab peninsula, Syria, Lebanon and Palestine,
history of Turkish-Arab relation and studies of collective memories and
literature, and the personality of the owners of memories as well as Jamal and
Fahreddin Pashas.”—Mohammed Alrmizan, Bosphorus
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