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A review by tophat8855
Birds Without Wings by Louis de Bernières
4.0
This is a very good book. It is dense and long, but worth it. It follows many people from a village in the Ottoman Empire, which becomes Turkey in the book and describes how World War II and the Turkish War for Independence affected the villages that were once inhabited by both Christians and Muslims, who would occasionally intermarry, but were, after the war, made to be only for Muslims as the Christians were deported to Greece and Muslim Greeks were deported to Turkey. It also follows Mustafa Kemal, who became the first president of modern day Turkey. And his life and work for the Turkish National Movement is intertwined in the story.
If you do not know much about this period of time (as I did not), I recommend reading the wikipedia article of Mustafa Kemal just to get some historical bearings.
At the end of the book when they Christians were being deported from Turkey, I was reminded of the current day exodus of Syrians taking boats across the Meditteranean to find respite in Greece and Italy and other parts of Europe. In this story, someone looking back at the deportations says that she doesn't believe it could happen "nowadays" but if we know anything about history, we current humans are not so modern that we won't torture, kill, or destroy other humans because we looked away or were following orders. Everything old is new again, or never was old to start with.
This is a book about war and about the results of war. It does not have happy endings. I am glad to have read it. It reads wonderfully between the voices of the characters.
If you do not know much about this period of time (as I did not), I recommend reading the wikipedia article of Mustafa Kemal just to get some historical bearings.
At the end of the book when they Christians were being deported from Turkey, I was reminded of the current day exodus of Syrians taking boats across the Meditteranean to find respite in Greece and Italy and other parts of Europe. In this story, someone looking back at the deportations says that she doesn't believe it could happen "nowadays" but if we know anything about history, we current humans are not so modern that we won't torture, kill, or destroy other humans because we looked away or were following orders. Everything old is new again, or never was old to start with.
This is a book about war and about the results of war. It does not have happy endings. I am glad to have read it. It reads wonderfully between the voices of the characters.