Turkish Kaleidoscope - by Jenny White (Paperback)

About the Book

"When Jenny White arrived in Turkey in 1975 to pursue a master's degree in Ankara, she had no idea that the country and her university were already embroiled in a vicious civil war. She learned quickly. In the simple everyday act of attending class, she encountered armed personnel carriers, bullets, bombs, and other dangers. By the time she left in 1978, the polarized fury of street violence between groups professing "leftist" and "rightist" views had enveloped the entire country. Trust broke down between citizens, and tolerance for thinking or behaving differently vanished. Agreement with and obedience to the leader of one's faction were paramount. It was not a time that allowed for complexity or nuance. Based on the author's personal experiences and her in-depth oral history interviews with older Turks who lived through that tumultuous period -- and informed by her years of ethnographic research in that country -- this graphic narrative book explores the origins of political factionalism and its descent into violence in 1970s Turkey, up until the 1980 coup. White's four main characters are fictional creations inspired by dozens of real people who participated in the fury of that period. They include leftists as well as rightists, men and women who, for various, conflicted reasons, joined extremist factions and took part in political violence. Through these vivid, real life stories of these characters' struggles to find their own paths through the thicket of ideological approaches and factions, the book offers a compelling narrative exploration of what drives people to engage in acts of political violence, at great personal cost to themselves and their families, at the behest of an autocratic leader. Jenny White's book also explores what motivates individuals in these situations to endanger themselves anew in order to break away from the extremist factions that have consumed their lives"--

Book Synopsis

A powerful graphic novel that traces Turkey's descent into political violence in the 1970s through the experiences of four students on opposing sides of the conflict

Turkish Kaleidoscope tells the stories of four unforgettable protagonists as they navigate a society torn apart by violent political factions. It is 1975 and Turkey is on the verge of civil war. Faruk and Orhan are from conservative shopkeeping families in eastern Anatolia that share a sense of new possibilities. Nuray is the daughter of villagers who have migrated to the provincial city where Yunus, the son of an imprisoned teacher, was raised in genteel poverty. While attending medical school in Ankara, Faruk draws a reluctant Orhan into a right-wing nationalist group while Nuray and Yunus join the left. Against a backdrop of escalating violence, the four students fall in love, have their hearts broken, get married, raise families, and struggle to get on with their lives. But the consequences of their decisions will follow them through their lives as their children begin the story anew, skewed through the kaleidoscope of historical events.

Inspired by Jenny White's own experiences as a student in Turkey during this tumultuous period as well as original oral histories of Turks who lived through it, Turkish Kaleidoscope reveals how violent factionalism has its own emotional and cultural logic that defies ideological explanations.

Review Quotes

"White captures all details in every snap-shot of her graphic-novel: meetings, demonstrations, graffiti, posters, fights and killings--horrendous events that not only divided the youth at the time but fostered further divisions. All this detail embellishes the human relations and their lives. They are so well captured in the book that one almost watches a documentary."---Hande Birkalan Gedik, Folklor-Edebiyat

About the Author

Jenny White is a social anthropologist and professor at the Stockholm University Institute for Turkish Studies. Her many books include Muslim Nationalism and the New Turks (Princeton) and the novel The Winter Thief. She lives in Stockholm. Twitter @WhiteJennyB Ergün Gündüz is a critically acclaimed artist and the author of numerous books and albums. His work spans graphic novels, comics, caricatures, animated films, book covers, and commercial art. He lives in Istanbul.