Just as they say that new heavenly bodies are fashioned from old cosmic dust, so the new world of Albania was to be formed from the dust of the old Ottoman universe, from that constellation of terrors and crimes, postprandial poisonings, night-time assassinations, monks holding lanterns in the rain, dervishes with knives and messages hidden in their hair, from that profusion of rebellious pashas, bureaux with thousands of files, informers, outlawed viziers and ‘black’ pashas with a price on their heads who swarmed like ghosts before or after their death – all the rotting debris of empire.
Book 8 of 13 for me from the Man Booker International longlist 2017.
Ismail Kadare’s Kamarja e turpit was published in 1978 but has only recently been translated into English, as The Traitor’s Niche, by John Hodgson, who has previously translated The Accident, The Fall of the Stone City, A Girl in Exile and The Three-Arched Bridge. The book reads very well in Hodgson’s translation which, unlike those done by some other Kadare translators (e.g. David Bellos and Barbara Bray) was taken from the Albanian original rather than a retranslation from the French. Hodgson has some interesting comments on Kadare’s language and how it has evolved in this interview https://www.penguin.co.uk/articles/on....
This book is set in the 1820s in the Ottoman Empire. The Traitor’s Niche of the title refers to a place in a public square in Istanbul (referred to throughout as the Centre) where the severed heads of disgraced viziers and rebel pashas are preserved and put on display to the public.
The remote province of Albania – known locally as Shqipëria a kind of convocation of eagles, with blood-stained feathers, that falls from the air, swooping through the storms - is in revolt, led by Ali Pasha Tepelena (now known as “Black Ali”). And as the book opens the head on display is that of the vizier Bugrahan Pasha, who failed in his attempt to supress Ali Pasha’s rebellion and was decapitated as punishment. The more senior Hurshid Pasha has now been sent to accomplish what Bugrahan couldn’t, but on the same pain of failure: “The niche now waited again, indifferently, for either Black Ali or the glorious Hurshid, the sultan’s favourite”.
The story, although narrated in the 3rd person, is told from the perspective of a number of different characters in the Centre and Albania; Abdulla, the then current Keeper of the Traitor's Niche; Hurshid Pasha; Tundra Hata, the Royal Messenger, responsible for delivering death sentences out from the Centre and then transporting back taking the severed heads, which he calls cabbages (the blade of destiny had harvested its crop, and there it was on the table, this white cabbage from the gardens of hell).; the rebellious Albanian ruler Ali Tepelena and his young wife Vasiliqia; and members of the Caw-caw unit (see below).
The tales of the severed heads take up much of the novel, particularly the early parts, and the narration is rife with black humour. Tundra Hata makes money on the side by showing off the heads to isolated villagers on his journey, the separation of head from body is twice used to illustrate husbands unable to perform their conjugal duties (Abdulla has so far been unable to consummate his new marriage, and Vasiliqia reflects that she had few physical encounters with her 80 year-old husband), and Tundra Hata and Abdulla both wrestle with the practical difficulties of preserving heads, particularly when the system is policed by a Kafkesque bureaucracy:
They tried to find some pretext to accuse the doctor and the keeper of not complying with the Regulations for the Care of Heads, and asked devious questions about the unnaturally yellow tinge of the vizier’s face and the lack of eye colour. Abdulla had been struck speechless, but the doctor courageously defended himself, and said that the vizier’s complexion, even in life, had been sallow, as is typical of men with rebellion and treason in their blood. As for the lack of colour in the eyes (which had in fact obviously begun to decompose), the doctor quoted the old saying that the eyes are a window to the soul: it would be useless to look for colour in the eyes of a man who had never had a soul. The doctor’s explanations were hardly convincing, not to say vacuous, but for this very reason they were hard to argue with. The inspectors were obliged to withdraw their remarks and the matter concluded with a mere reprimand and a warning of dismissal for Abdulla.
The book’s events are based on real history – Hurshid Pasha (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurshid...) and Black Ali really existed (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ali_Pas...) - although Kadare has altered facts to suit his purpose. The novel formed part of a linked trilogy of novels starting with the 1978 Ura me tri harqe (The Three-arched Bridge) (1978) and ending in 1981 with Pallati i ëndrrave (The Palace of Dreams), all written under the censorship of the Stalinist Enver Hoxha regime. The Independent explains how “by setting about Albanian nationalism at the heart of a state bureaucracy, Kadare was able to promote national pride while condemning political dictatorship”, although The Palace of Dreams proved a novel too far, being banned in Albania and ultimately leading to Kadare’s political exile in Paris in 1990.
And to me the most striking part of the book wasn’t the severed heads, but Kadare’s concept of the Caw-caw unit, part of the Ottoman bureaucracy and secret police (alongside the Palace of Dreams and the Department of Psst-Psst, who sweep up rumours and muttered asides):
The partial or full erasure of the national identity of peoples, which was the main task of the Central Archive, was carried out according to the old secret doctrine of Caw-caw and passed through five principal stages: first, the physical crushing of rebellion; second, the extirpation of any idea of rebellion; third, the destruction of culture, art and tradition; fourth, the eradication or impoverishment of the language; and fifth, the extinction or enfeeblement of the national memory.
Neil's review discusses this topic in more detail and says everything I would want to say https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
Kadare won the inaugural Man Booker International Prize in 2005 it its previous incarnation recognising an author’s work rather than individual novels, and his books have also been previously twice shortlisted for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize, so it seems fitting that this belatedly translated work features on the 2017 Man Booker International which merges the two previous prizes.
Overall - a powerful and fascinating story, my favourite of the 4 Kadare novels I have read to date, and while not for me one for overall MBI victory, this may well feature on my personal shortlist. Ismail Kadare It's not often that the main characters in a novel consist of three heads.
In this Kadare novel, he gives us early 1800s and yet another attempt of forming an independent Albanian nation. The first Ottoman Vizier sent to put the Albanians in their place fails to do so and loses his head. The second Vizier wins and sends his Albanian foe's head back to Constantinople. But he becomes too popular and so his death is ordered but he is forewarned and commits suicide. Nonetheless his body is found, beheaded and head sent back to the set of power.
Kadare explores the bureaucratic Ottoman Empire and it's deadly punishments for anyone who goes against it. He also explores why Albania finds itself a vassal of the more powerful. His books are great examples of how historical fiction can be so powerful. Ismail Kadare Fascinating, mesmerizing surreal novel that held my interest every page. The author has returned to the main theme of most of his oeuvre: struggles of his native Albania against an oppressive power. This time the novel is set in the post-Napoleonic years and those of Greece for her independence--1820s. In this case the novel is an allegory with the Ottoman Empire representing the brutal Albanian dictatorship of Enver Hoxha. It is the story of several men and their fates: Abdulla, the Keeper of the Heads--Dulla was a nickname of Enver Hoxha--; the three Pashas who have run afoul of the government in some way and have been beheaded: Ali, by rebelling; Bugrahan, by losing battles to Ali; Hurshid, who wins the war, but becomes too popular for his own good; and Hata, the courier who delivers each head to the sultan after exhibiting it to villagers along the way. The author describes Caw-Caw, the complete obliteration of an entire people's culture, customs, and language and of Psst-Psst, the secret police investigating rumors. All in all, a chilling indictment of tyranny. 4.5/5.
Highly recommended and just as current today as when it was first written, in 1984. Ismail Kadare Traitor's Niche is a place where heads of traitors were displayed for public to see and know what happens when they question authority in Ottoman empire. The idea of characters being constantly made face to face with a dead face and thoughts that might occur to him might have been interesting. But it actually turned out to be most boring book I have read out of international booker lists so far. I don't know how it ever got listed. The narrative isnt stimulating and there isn't much of a plot either. Ismail Kadare I did not expect to really enjoy a book about a niche in a wall in Constantinople where the heads of traitors are put on display and carefully tended. Also surprising is that this book was written 40 years ago, because it feels very current. Unfortunately, powerful regimes stopping at nothing to silence those who rebel against them is still relevant. The real strength of this book to me is that it is both meaningful & cleverly written.
The writing is beautiful. The story is set in the winter of the 1800s : The February wind whistled in a thousand languages across the plain darkened by winter and war. It is February in all the infinite lands of the empire, he groaned to himself. Why should he think there might be a fragment of March somewhere, or even a scrap of April? A little March for the empire's chosen sons, he thought. But it was February for everyone.
Whether it makes the official MBI shortlist or not, I expect it will be on my own personal shortlist.
Ismail Kadare
characters The Traitors Niche
At the heart of the Ottoman Empire, in the main square of Constantinople, a niche is carved into ancient stone. Here, the sultan displays the severed heads of his adversaries. People flock to see the latest head and gossip about the state of the empire: the province of Albania is demanding independence again, and the niche awaits a new trophy…
Tundj Hata, the imperial courier, is charged with transporting heads to the capital – a task he relishes and performs with fervour. But as he travels through obscure and impoverished territories, he makes money from illicit side-shows, offering villagers the spectacle of death. The head of the rebellious Albanian governor would fetch a very high price.
The Traitor’s Niche is a surreal tale of rebellion and tyranny, in a land where armies carry scarecrows, state officials ban entire languages, and the act of forgetting is more complicated than remembering. The Traitors Niche
The unblinking eyes met the stares of the passersby and tourists who poured into the square from all directions. The tourists’ own gaze, like that of all moving crowds, was mild and unfocused, but people’s eyes suddenly froze as soon as they encountered this sight, as if their astonished pupils struggled to sink back into the depths of their skulls, and only the impossibility of doing this compelled them to stand still and face what they saw. Most went pale, some wanted to vomit. Only a few looked on calmly. The eyes were indifferent, of a color you could not call bluish or even gray, and which it was hard to name, because it was less of a color than the distant reflection of a void.Ooh, ooh, can I get a selfie?
Here’s a heads up for you. Ismail Kadare is an author of note. He was the first recipient of the International Man Booker prize in 2005, and is frequently mentioned as a candidate for the Nobel. There is always a bit of a downside in understanding when one enters a considerable literary oeuvre anywhere but at the beginning. Odds are the name Kadare is as new to you as it was to me. He has been at it since the 1960s. A native, he studied in Communist Albania’s University of Tirana, and later at an institute in Moscow, returning home when the Soviet Union and Albania parted ways in 1960, but not before publishing a collection of poems in Russian and writing his first novel, which was daring in his world, as it was a stark contrast to the social realism literary form preached by Communist leadership. His work was banned by Albanian officials, and he was blocked from publishing for three years. He had a breakthrough in 1970 when a 1963 novel of his was translated into French, gaining him international notice.
Ismail Kadare - image from his FB page
Kadare is both a political/historical satirist and a champion of the Albanian language, doing what he can to keep it alive, and even doing some promotional housekeeping by restoring the use of Albanian words where foreign words have found their way into the language. It is a dodgy enterprise, of course, writing criticism of one’s autocratic political leadership. Tends to leave one with prolonged periods of barred isolation or, in extreme situations, can result in a bad case of dead. Kadare did what he could to keep his body parts attached and keep himself free to move about. This entailed some compromise, which earned him the antipathy of many.
Nevertheless, he has managed to produce a large volume of work over the decades. Born in 1936, he is now (2018) 82 years old. The Traitor’s Niche was released in 1978. You can check here for a list of his considerable published work. So how does one continue to call out one’s government for their crimes, and somehow manage to stay alive? By never going after them overtly. Kadare’s forte is allusion, suggestion, implication. Thus deniability. Of course, it is entirely possible to look at his work in multiple dimensions. Well, keep in mind that I have read only this one, so am making an educated guess here.
1870s Constantinople- image from wikipedia
First is the story itself. Does it move forward? Are the characters interesting? I must say that while I found the story (or really the sub-stories within) interesting at times, it was clearly not the thing, overall. Even knowing nothing about the author it was clear that this was about something other than the specifics of this-then-that. The story is a multi-narrator description of a time when a capital city, Istanbul, formerly Byzantium, Augusta Antonina, New Rome, Constantinople, and a few besides, included in one of the gates to the city a special niche. It was a small stage on which would be displayed the severed head of an enemy of the state, an attempt to discourage thoughts of breaking away from the Ottoman super power empire.
Abdulla, the third Keeper of the Niche (don’t ask about the first two), is in charge of the head, which he inspects twice a day. Even jobs of this sort are fraught with peril, as one keeper of a particular statue was transported for life for the high crime of allowing a rust stain to appear on its western face. Abdulla has issues of his own outside work. While his larger head is willing, his little head is not, at least when it comes to his bride. He even dreams of discarding his body and being reduced solely to a head, so expectations of him would be reduced.
Ahmet Fountain – image from Turkish Culture Portal
Hurshid Pasha, commander of Ottoman troops, has been sent to Albania to retrieve the head of a rebellious leader, Black Ali, aka Ali Pasha Teplena. The mission quickly completed, off-screen, he hands the prize over to a courier, Tundj Hata. Tundj has made a bit of a business for himself out of this job, as people in towns along his route back to the capital are willing to pay to see a severed head, particularly of someone so important.
Tundj Hata laid the bag on the wooden bench and announced in a resounding voice:Not exactly a rabbit out of a hat, but Abracadabra, indeed. Tundj has a rather troubling relationship with the heads he transports, almost ghoulish, almost sexual. He talks to them way too much. Guy is definitely a creepazoid. There is one hilarious scene with Tundj, when he needs to dry out one of his passengers and takes it out in an unlikely place.
“Ali Teplena, Black Prince, governor of Albania, a pasha of the first rank, and member of the Council of Ministers.”
As he uttered the last word, he put his hand in the bag and, gripping the head by the hair, drew it out in a swift movement…As the cold tightened its grip, the spectators felt drawn closer to the frontier of death, almost touching it.
Istanbul, 1850s - image from Ottoman Imperial Archive
Ali Pasha’s beautiful 22-year-old widow, Vasiliqia, considers her options. She recalls for us her late hubby’s plan for Albanian independence. The old guy (82) had thought to rally the nation around him to pull away from the empire, neglecting to consider that he had treated the Albanian people shabbily for the entirety of his tenure, so was left with no allies, no public support, and no…well, you know.
Others are brought in to fill us in on how the empire goes about destroying those who would oppose it.
The partial or full erasure of the national identity of peoples, which was the main task of the Central Archive, was carried out according to the old secret doctrine of Caw-caw and passed through five principal stages: first, the physical crushing of rebellion; second, the extirpation of any idea of rebellion; third, the destruction of culture, art, and tradition; fourth the eradication or impoverishment of the language; and fifth, the extinction or enfeeblement of the national memory. The briefest of all these stages was the physical crushing of rebellion, which merely meant war, but the longest phase was the reduction of the language into Nonspeak, as it was called for short.
Istanbul in 1858 – image from AGWallace.wordpress.com
Was this how things were done in the days of the Ottomans? No idea. Maybe, maybe not. But one would expect that the barbs being inserted here were intended for the Yugoslavs who were bent on absorbing Albania into their nation, and the hide of the Albanian Communist leaders of his time, a brutal Stalinist dictatorship that switched allegiance to Mao’s China when relations with the Soviet Union went south, local leadership insisting, despite Nikita Khrushchev’s declarations, that Stalin was really an ok guy. Tens of thousands were executed during the brutal dictatorship (of the proletariat, of course) of Enver Hoxha.
There are perils for sure, as no head appears to be securely attached, whether because of harboring dreams of independence, being in the way of someone else’s rise through the ranks, or maybe pissing off the wrong politician. While horrific, those might be at least understandable reasons. One might also come to a bad end because of some idiot’s interpretation of a prisoner’s dreams. The actual Palace of Dreams is given a literal interpretation here. This may be the 19th century, but it is a very dark age indeed.
Edirne, 19th Century - image from Ottoman Imperial Archives
While Kadare’s character portraits are far from compelling, they do offer meaningful perspectives. How might a lowly bureaucrat react to a whimsical government? How to cope when the logic of leadership is inexplicable? I imagine one can find an example of that sort of stress very close to home. But Kadare is not solely writing about the Ottoman rule, and its attempt to erase the Albanian nation and culture from human memory. He is also writing about the 20th century attempt by Yugoslavia to absorb Albania, and the Soviet attempt to control it. The pushing and pulling of Albania by diverse powers finds a concrete manifestation here.
the distant sound of wheels reached Hurshid Pasha’s ears. He’s gone, he thought. Wrapping his shoulders in a woolen blanket, he closed his eyes for the tenth time, but still he couldn’t sleep. He felt a constant pressure in his temples. The hissing wind, racing low over the surface of the land, seemed to penetrate his skull. The head has set off for Asia, he thought, but the body remains in Europe. His imagination conjured up some sticky, ectoplasmic creature, pulled by both continents, endlessly lengthening and becoming thinner and more transparent, as if at any moment it might turn into some ethereal substance, something between a cloud and the tail of a cometI found the bit about posting a head marginally effective. Nations do display a strong inclination toward cohering around a perceived (or fluffed up) common enemy, so it does make sense. And this sort of thing has been used as a warning in many cultures. FYI, while I did not turn up a Traitor’s Niche in my slight research into Ottoman public spaces in Istanbul I did come across mention of the Edirne Palace, which was a sometime capitol. It included a Justice Pavilion with two stone columns in front of it. One of those was named the “Warning Stone” and was used for displaying the heads of criminals. So much more permanent than an apology tour.
Hagia Sophia - image from picturesforwalls.com
The writer whose work most popped to mind while reading this was Kafka, for the wide gulf between cause and effect and the paranoia that seems both extreme and justified, something Kadare is certainly familiar with, living as he did under an oppressive autocratic regime, well, until he left the country, anyway.
This is not a gripping, action-adventure read. Things do happen, and characters do move from here to there, but this is much more an intellectual than a visceral book. It helps to know who Kadare is, and it helps to have at least a surface familiarity with the history of Albania. Both are easily taken care of with a visit to wikipedia. If you enjoy Kafka, and his take on the madness of the world, you will probably enjoy The Traitor’s Niche. There is dark humor here that made me smile on occasion, an appreciation for human folly, present in all times, and among all nationalities. What I found more engaging was the look, in the latter third of the book, on how conquerors go about erasing the culture and identity of the conquered. Many echoes there of today’s world. This was the strongest element of the book for me. The translation was one step removed, as John Hodgson translated this to English from the French translation. Who knows what nuances from the original Albanian were lost in the two subsequent trips through the word-grinder?
Istanbul, 1800s - image from Ottoman Imperial Archive
Although Kadare is a well-regarded, world renowned author, I was not blown away by The Traitor’s Gate. While I do respect the craft on display here, and while I was very impressed with his description of how nations disappear other nations, it was not a gripping read. If this particular form of literature is your cuppa, it is a five-star read, for sure, but if you require more visceral engagement you will find it disappointing. Kadare, of course, deserves all the credit and attention he can get for having produced serious works of art under such perilous conditions, however many stars you might assign. My gut wants to give this book three stars. My brain wants to give it five for the author’s daring and inventiveness. So, four it is. Head and heart working together, well, until they take me away.
Publication
-----June 12, 2018 – English translation in the USA
-----1978 in original Albanian
Review – directly in American English – July 20, 2018
=============================EXTRA STUFF
The author’s FB page
A Nice piece on Kadare in Britannica
John Hodgon article on Kadare - What is Ismail Kadare like in Albanian?
Interesting wiki on George Castriot, aka Skanderbeg, a seminal figure in Albanian history, who comes in for significant mention in the novel Ismail Kadare Black Ali: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ali_Pas...
Hurshid Pasha: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurshid...
The Sultan of that time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmud_II
In the main square of Constantinople of the Ottoman Empire is a niche in stone which displays the severed heads of sultan’s adversaries, much visited, where gossip of Albania’s independence demands now appear in people’s talks. The year is 1822, only some time before the downward line of the decline of the empire will start, but already first signs seem to be in the air. One viewpoint in this story is of Tundj Hata, the imperial field courier, who transports new heads to the capital from the Western side of the empire, using this chance to give illicit side-shows in peasant villages on the way. We follow the aftermath of the death of Ali Pasha, the newest head to be carried to the capital, but not the last.
We follow the thoughts of more than just one person in this story: Abdulla, the keeper of the niche, whose health has always been delicate (and who ); Hurshid Pasha, who has been victorious but now fears that his head is also in danger because of ; Vasiliqia, the widow of Ali Pasha, who has met Byron when he came to visit, and who ponders on the last days of the Pasha, before she is taken to the capital; some thoughts of the people who have arrived to Albania to consider what will be the fate of it after this also appear – will it perhaps be given the sentence of ‘caw-caw’, the erasing of a land’s national identity (culture, language, clothes, buildings etc.), which has happened to some countries Tundj Hata passes on his way back to the capital – safer to travel through than countries in a state of emergency where people turn on each other.
One gets a feel of the cold of winter in this story, mostly in the places outside the capital – the snow, wind, mud of Albania, the snow-covered villages there and in Caw-Caw lands east of it, the easy availability of snow for preserving the heads, the cold of Ali Pasha’s castle, the sound of ice under Hurshid Pasha’s feet as he walks around the camp. The mood of the book gives one a sense of the empire’s delicate balance, of modern things appearing (the foreign press, newspapers, Byron, Napoleon…), the feel of the capital and its various buildings and the sound of many voices of the people observing what’s in the traitor’s niche now – which bookends this book quite nicely, blurring the story’s edges.
(In chapter four there is a mention of the battle of the Plain Of Kosovo, and the shrine for sultan Murad near it; this part is further expanded in the author's later book, “Elegy For Kosovo”, which I have already reviewed earlier.)
I think it’s interesting to observe Tundj Hata’s variety of moods as he travels back from Albania, . It’s not like he’s new to this work; he’s been doing it for a while now, and can remember some particularly good trips. In this empire, each direction where the heads come from has its own gate, one for European side, one for the Asian side, and we get to read the reactions of the western gate’s guards when Tundj arrives to it.
Once again I was pulled in by the author's style of language, the moods and the history of the book, with some things I haven’t heard before, which is always nice. It shows how hard it is sometimes for the empire to control its people, no matter how octopus-like capital wants to have a say in everything the people are, the people desire there. And always at some point things start to come apart, sometimes so that only afterwards one might see them. Following the viewpoints of some of the people within empire, often at the mercy of the system one way or another, was a good experience in seeing what it could be like at this point of time. Ismail Kadare Never has a story with so many severed heads contained so little violence. Or dread. It's the normality of things I guess, the dissolution of the horrid, that is what is brilliant in itself...
I've never read an Albanian novel before, but Ismail Kadare's style seems a bit style-less, repetitive, & not as Western-ready as I had predicted (for instance, there is no plot to speak of). That there is a public place that requires a traitors head to satiate the people-- this is a metaphor that not an entire novel makes. Ismail Kadare ”The head was establishing its rapport with the crowd. Its glassy eyes sought human eyes. Death hung in the air, transparently visible. As the cold tightened its grip, the spectators felt drawn closer to the frontier of death, almost touching it. In a few moments the crowd and death would congeal in a waxen, translucent unity.”
Black Ali Pasha of Albania has decided at the age of 82 to rebel against the Sultan in Constantinople. It is not readily clear if he has a death wish or at least that he wants to have a brief moment of perceived freedom before his head is separated from his body.
He knows. The Sultan knows. Everyone knows he won’t win.
The Sultan sends his soldiers to Albania carrying their menacing, black scarecrows, striking terror on the level of stormtroopers or the Waffen-SS
The traitor’s niche in the Cannon Gate awaits Black Ali’s head.
At the Traitor’s Niche, there is a man by the name of Abdulla who is assigned the task of watching over the Niche. He examines the heads twice a day to make sure they are not deteriorating. If anything goes awry with one of the heads, it will be his head. He has recently married and is having trouble…. ”He felt betrayed. His body was slowly failing, about to give up. But the brunt of his anger was directed towards what had previously been his greatest joy: his cock. He could not forgive it. When he was not with his bride, when he was in the street or the cafe or even at the site of his sacred duty, it would unexpectedly swell and be ready for any exploit, but when he was with his wife it became flabby, shrank, and retreated like a puppy faced with a tiger. And so he cursed it for its treachery.”
Before the heads reach Abdulla, they have to be fetched from sometimes the far reaches of the empire. The odious Tundj Hata is the man for that job. It is a nasty assignment which most people would do because they have no choice, but Hata loves it. In fact, you might even say he relishes it. He is pale with a henna stained beard. So what does a man like this dream about as he is riding in a carriage with a snow wrapped head from Albania?
”His brain resembled some clinging creature with the inner luminescence of a glow-worm, whose slime smeared the domes of mosques and mausoleums, banknotes, and the wombs of women awaiting insemination.”
*Shiver*
There is a great emphasis on dreams in the Turkish empire, and soldiers on the march are required to turn in their dreams for analysis so the dream interpreters can sift through their muddled thoughts in search of omens of the near future. The Palace of Dreams back in Constantinople requires dreams from the citizens as well. It sort of reminds me of Roman priests looking at the entrails of a fatted calf to determine if the auguries are favorable.
The empire also has a system to bring a conquered country fully under their control. There are five principal stages:
A physical crushing of the rebellion.
The extirpation of any idea of rebellion.
The destruction of culture, art, and tradition.
The eradication or impoverishment of the language.
The extinction or enfeeblement of the national memory.
Ismail Kadare takes us into the minds of Black Ali Pasha, his 22 year old bride, Hurshid Pasha the conqueror of Albania, Abdulla the keeper of the heads, and Tundj Hata the fetcher of the heads, and by doing so gives us a complete picture of a brutal world at the height of Turkish conquest. I remember having a similar experience when I read his book The Siege. I was completely submerged in the minds of the principle characters. This access bloomed the ramifications of the events of the story into a grand epic of images . Kadare writes these thoughtful, stark passages, and every sentence is so finely honed that it makes me wonder how much better it would be in his native Albanian. Another wonderful adventure with Kadare with extra bonus points for a cameo by Lord Byron himself.
If you wish to see more of my most recent book and movie reviews, visit http://www.jeffreykeeten.com
I also have a Facebook blogger page at:https://www.facebook.com/JeffreyKeeten Ismail Kadare “Perhaps nowhere else could the eyes of passers-by so easily grasp the interdependency between the imposing solidity of the ancient square and the human heads that had dared to show it disrespect.”
Ismail Kadare’s The Traitor’s Niche opens in the capital of the Ottoman Empire, Constantinople, in a public square where tourists come to drink coffee and gawk. Known as the Traitor’s Niche, this square is where the sultan displays the severed heads of the Ottoman’s Empire’s latest enemy. Kadare presents this display as more than some macabre and anachronistic ritual. What the severed heads represent to establishing order and claiming cultural legitimacy, in both the center of the empire as well as its far flung provinces (here it’s Albania) lies at the heart of The Traitor’s Niche. Kirkus Review called this novel “A political fable of decapitation amid totalitarian oppression combines wickedly funny satire with darker, deeper lessons.” I like this characterization. There are definitely lessons here, especially about authoritarianism, but the comedy doesn’t roll off the pages. It’s something you need to grapple with. Though it is a short novel, there’s a lot going on and Kadare moves from a detailed and realistic picture of life in the empire to a more abstract battle of memory. The common thread is somehow the severed heads.
Even though The Traitor’s Niche is short, don’t think of this as an easy book to get through. With its shifting cast of perspectives and lack of traditional plot, it is sometimes difficult to follow. However, the ending is powerful (and wickedly funny) and brings the book back into stark focus.
I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Ismail Kadare