Author Archives: Catherine Yiğit
Focus on Turkey
Next week the London Book Fair takes place in Earls Court in London. It looks like it will be a great event with over 1600 exhibitors from 58 countries. Turkey is the Market Focus this year and will have a large presence at the fair. From cultural events, translation seminars, author interviews and much more … Continue reading
Global Friends
A few months ago I participated in a six-week workshop called SUM-it UP run by Global Niche. I’ve known Anastasia and Tara, founders of Global Niche, for many years. We have something in common as wives who followed Turkish men home. The course itself looked deceptively simple. Six weeks of working through visions and goals, … Continue reading
I’d like to thank…
I’ve been struggling a little lately with blogging. It’s into the New Year and yet there are no new posts, several reviews waiting to be written and an air of hesitation prevails. So it was a terrific boost when Sezin Koehler nominated me as a Very Inspiring Blogger. Sezin is a terrific wonderful amazing sister … Continue reading
Translating a Holiday
One of the things that regularly drives me distracted is the constant mixing up of Christmas and New Years in Turkey. I’ve even mentioned it before. But my perspective is changing, a little, with time. First there’s the fact that many of the traditions associated with Christmas actually came from other festivals. The date of … Continue reading
Voyager in Cliché
Review of “Gizli Anların Yolcusu” by Ayşe Kulin Everest Yayinlari 2011 I groaned aloud while reading this book, I couldn’t help it. One lover snuck up behind the other, covered his eyes. The younger said “I wonder who that is. I wonder whose hands those are, let me think,” before delivering the killer line … Continue reading
Alphabet Soup
Before Ataturk the written language in Turkey was Ottoman. It was an ornate language, using the Arabic script, which didn’t fit the phonetics of the language, and borrowed heavily from Arabic and Persian. It did not coincide with the language spoken across Anatolia, which was reasonably similar to Turkish. The effect was to divide the … Continue reading
Loyalty
Review of ‘Sadakat’ by Inci Aral Turkuvaz Kitap 2009 This is a subtle and disturbing book. It starts with Azra (name meaning ‘virginal, untouched’) writing a journal from her communal prison cell. She is in prison awaiting the results of a post mortem on her husband’s body, accused of murdering him. She details her … Continue reading
Book Fairs Galore…
Last week saw Canakkale’s 1st International Book Fair, held in the Megaron Conference centre in the Kolin Hotel. The book fair consisted of one book shop from downtown, a few publishers, foundations and local authors. On the day I visited the international was provided by a stand apparently run by the Cuban tourist board (there … Continue reading
Translation Day
Over the summer I came across a competition which I felt compelled to enter. It was to translate one or more prose pieces or one or more poems from Turkish into English. Though I’d never attempted literary translation and had only been doing technical translation (of academic papers) for six months I thought I’d give … Continue reading
Global Niche Alliance
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