Turkey Unveiled: A History of Modern Turkey

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Summary: Have not read, but very interested...
Review: A typical reaction of denial demonstrated by Turkish and pro-Turkish reviewers is already making me very interested in the book. Positive and balanced recommendation by more neutral and objective readers reinforces this decision. Will definitely buy.

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Summary: Read it before you visit
Review: At the outset I should declare my interest as a good friend of co-author Nicole Pope. Notwithstanding, I regard Turkey Unveiled as an outstanding historical, political and cultural guide to the country. I only wish I had read it before visiting for the first time early this year - it reveals and explains (as the title suggests) so much of the richness and complexity of this fascinating country. The text is elegant, easy and accessible (and - remarkably in this day and age - almost completely typo-free). Unusually for a co-authored book, it is quite seamless - the reader cannot tell where one author leaves off and the other begins. Turkey Unveiled has been criticised in almost equal instalments by Turkish nationalists and by Western libertarians who condemn Turkey's past and present human rights record - a good indication that the authors have got the balance about right. Its great strength is that it documents without proselytising. There is no shying away from the historical record, but the historical context and the uncertainties surrounding such matters as body counts (no one really knows how many Armenians were massacred during and after World War I) are carefully and cautiously explained. Buy it and read it before you visit - you'll get so much more from your trip.

Rating:
Summary: Have not read, but very interested...
Review: Aurtor is not objective on historical issues.its hard to read and understand a person who knows nothing about Turkey .
also %80 percent of the book is about is politicians and politics.There is better books about Turkey dont waste your time and money on this one.

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Summary: Tries to be objective, but not really
Review: I enjoyed the book as a Turkish person knowing most of the history of the country, however, I thought that the book had major problems:

1- If you don't know the basics of the Turkish history in the last 50 years, you'll be lost. Too much detail in politicians and parties.

2- The authors portray that somehow, the founder of The Republic of Turkey, Ataturk, and his ideology is guilty of most of the problems that Turkey has today. That is far, I mean FAR, from the truth. If it was not Ataturk and his comrads, we either would not have existed, or, would have been a neglected colony of the West (since there is no oil in Turkey) like Afghanistan. A compelling majority of Turks today, excluding the islamists who wants to turn the country into an Islamic Theocracy, regard Ataturk as the saviour, and feel indebted for life.

3- The book gives so much sympathy to the Islamists.
4- The book barely touches the "touchy" subjects, such as the minorities.

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Summary: Leave history-writing to scholars ....
Review: I have found this book very polemical and sensationalist. You can tell the authors' journalistic background easily by their narrative: they emphasize sensational points in the story rather than convey history. They do this often through isolated individual examples and apply it to the entire country or Turkish people. It's definitely not scientific. Often times you feel like you're watching an episode of "48 hours" where an uninteresting story is overdramatized and skewed to make it interesting.

It's also unfortunate that the authors, having lived in Turkey as long as they have, have not "got" the culture yet. They misinterpret many things about the language as well as the culture.

From now on, I will pay closer attention to the credentials of the authors before picking up a book.

Rating:
Summary: Very useful introduction to a complex subject
Review: It is not the easiest thing to write a book on Turkey that is balanced and attentive to detail while at the same time helpful to the general reader. As earlier reviews indicate, Turkey often arouses strong emotions abroad. But the Popes do a good job. They are enthusiastic about the country they live in and believe it has a promising future. Perhaps they should say more about the darker sides of Turkish history in the 20th century. But it is clearly their aim to strip away the more extreme stereotypes that persist in Western perceptions of modern Turkey. Overall, a very illuminating book in a field short of good introductions to the subject.

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Summary: A "must read" to understand Turkey's complexities.
Review: More than any country Turkey has been almost deliberately misunderstood in Europe and in the United States. Some of the misunderstanding comes from lazy thinking, much is ignorance and the rest predjudice combined with politics. Nicole and Hugh Pope, who speak Turkish as well as several other languages, have lived for the past decade in Instanbul. Their clear-eyed understanding of Turkey's promise and problems is clearly conveyed in this well written book. It is a "must read" for anyone who wants to understand the reality of this complex and fascinating country.

It's difficult to think of a country in a more complex neighborhood. Turkey has borders with Greece, Bulgaria, Georgia, Armenia, Iran, Iraq and Syria. Turkey's relations with each brings a different set of complexities. Ironically Turkey's most strained relations are with it's NATO ally, Greece. Internally Turkey's relations with its Kurdish minority, creates a tension with no signs of easy resolution yet are less hostile than many in the west realize. The Popes explore and explain with a depth of understanding and feeling that can only come not only knowing the language and the people but from having the energy and curiosity to travel widely and interview citizens at all levels of society.

This is not a travelogue but a serious history of modern Turkey. Still one wishes they'd found a way to mention the joys of walking through both the rich and poor neighborhoods of Istanbul where a foreigner can see and experience first hand the Turks righly famous hospitality as well as the dynamic tension inherent in a rapidly changing society where you can see traditionally garbed mothers walking with short skirted, lipsticked daughters.

Since Mustafa Kemal Attaturk the Turks have dealt with adversity. The Popes describe a country that is at once moving towards modernity, and possibly prosperity, while at the same time is rediscovering its past. Turkey is a work in progress. The Popes do a masterful job of describing the progress to date, warts and all.

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Summary: Turkey Unveiled: A History of Modern Turkey.
Review: The title is unfortunate; the subtitle not quite accurate. "Modern Turkey" usually means starting in about 1800 and trailing off somewhere in the last generation; this appears to be another once-over that familiar ground, but it is not. Instead, the Popes (a wife-husband time), in a well-written and reliable account, devote three quarters of their study to the years since 1960. Chapters deal, in a sympathetic but always critical manner, with such issues as the military coups, the Cyprus issue, the Kurdish problem, domestic economic developments, the newly-liberated Turkic republics, the Tansu Çiller fiasco, and the Islamist phenomenon. Throughout, the Popes blame much that they find in Turkey on the modern state's founder, Kemal Atatürk, including the "repression, the intense national paranoia, the shortcomings of its democracy and the over-reliance on the army."

Perhaps most interesting is their account of Türgut Özal, the man who dominated Turkish politics between 1983 and his death in 1993. He was "the catalyst for much of the breathless pace of change that revolutionized Turkey" during that decade-long period. His influence extended to much of Turkish public life: "Undermining the Kemalist bastions of state dominance of business and the media, flamboyantly popularizing a new ideology of the market and international trade, irreverently breaking taboos about the military, Islam and the Kurds, Türgut Özal became Turkey's most influential political personality since Atatürk." The authors catch his contradictions ("for all his Muslim piety, [he] liked to finish off a bottle of his favorite Courvoisier brandy") and his foibles ("He is like a piece of soft iron. Whatever magnet he sees, he sticks to"), without undermining his outsized and constructive role.

Middle East Quarterly, December 1999

Rating:
Summary: A Great Book
Review: This a great book for those who want to read something reliable and unbiased about the real face of Turkey far from opinions of people like Bernard Lewis and Erik Zurcher.. Beside the positive side there is a lot to know about the repression of the Kurds and the occupation of Kurdistan, the Armenian and Greek genocides, the repeated military coups, the Kemalist Jingoism and the assimilation to the West... I highly reccomend this book.

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Summary: This book made me sick! Read Marline Howe instead
Review: Too bad that this book employs the kitchen-sink model for writing history. The authors restlessly dance around the 20th century in an effort to compartmentalize various aspects of Turkey's modern history into chapters devoted to the legacy of Kemal Ataturk, foreign policy, struggles toward democracy, and the continuing clout of the military in the nation's affairs.
The authors know a lot, but their story is so scrambled that the reader can't make any pattern in this fascinating country's history. A pity.