Turkish Reflections : A Biography of a Place

Rating:
Summary: Interesting
Review: This is an interesting book about a dynamic country. Highly recommended... It tries to do justice to the etnic diversity and tolearance of a country where hundreds of ethnicities peacefully live today under the umbrella of Turkish citizenship. In contrast to the review below, all the ancient cultures of Anatolia and the Balkans are alive in Turkey -- most of whose population consists of Moslemized (but very secular) descendants of those ancient peoples. Isolated outburts of religious/ethnic strife under the Ottomans (during WW I) and later in 1955 (during a Cyprus crisis) do not detract from the tolerance and ethnic harmony of a country which is a veritable mosaic of peoples from the Caucasus to the Balkans, from Albanians to Kurds. Mary Lee Settle draws a good portrait of a fascinating country in which ancient Greece, modern Europe, Hittite culture etc are alive, side by side.