Birds Without Wings (Hardcover)

by Louis de Bernières (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
It's been nearly a decade since Captain Corelli's Mandolin became a word-of-mouth bestseller (and then a major feature film), and devotees will eagerly dig into de Bernières' sweeping historical follow-up. This time the setting is the small Anatolian town of Eskibahçe, in the waning days of the Ottoman Empire. The large cast of characters of intermixed Turkish, Greek and Armenian descent includes breathtakingly lovely Philothei, a Christian girl, and her beloved Ibrahim, the childhood friend and Muslim to whom she is betrothed. The narrative immediately sets up Philothei's death and Ibrahim's madness as the focal tragedy caused by the sweep of history—but this is a bit of a red herring. Various first-person voices alternate in brief chapters with an authorial perspective that details the interactions of the town's residents as the region is torn apart by war; a parallel set of chapters follows the life of Kemal Atatürk, who established Turkey as a modern, secular country. The necessary historical information can be tedious, and stilted prose renders some key characters (like Philothei) one-dimensional. But when de Bernières relaxes his grip on the grand sweep of history—as he does with the lively and affecting anecdotes involving the Muslim landlord Rustem Bey and his wife and mistress—the results resonate with the very personal consequences that large-scale change can effect. Though some readers may balk at the novel's sheer heft, the reward is an effective and moving portrayal of a way of life—and lives—that might, if not for Bernières's careful exposition and imagination, be lost to memory forever.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From The New Yorker
"Destiny caresses the few, but molests the many," a proverb-prone narrator reflects as he begins the story of Eskibahçe, a small town in Anatolia, and of its inhabitants' fate in the turmoil of the early twentieth century. After generations of cheerful intermingling, the town's Muslim Turks, Christian Greeks, and Armenians are divided by the First World War and then by the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. De Bernières gamely tries to illustrate the human cost—a complex series of migrations and persecutions—through a cast of endearing, folksy characters. He interleaves the narratives with the biography of Kemal Atatürk. But history, in this case, may be too vast for his approach; despite many affecting moments, both the big picture and the small stories are lost in an overwhelming sprawl.
Copyright © 2005 The New Yorker

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 576 pages
• Publisher: Knopf; First American Edition edition (August 24, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1400043417
• ISBN-13: 978-1400043415
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.5 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (32 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #294,580 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

50 of 53 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Haunting story of war and survival, October 9, 2004

By	Eileen Rieback (Coral Springs, FL USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

"Birds Without Wings" is an exceptionally beautiful novel that takes place during the waning period of the Ottoman Empire, in the small Anatolian town of Eskibahce. As the story opens, an ethnic mix of Turks, Armenians, and Greeks, both Muslims and Christians, are living side-by-side in a comfortable and relatively peaceful existence. But first the Franks, as the Ottomans call the Western Europeans, and then the Greeks invade their homeland. These events set off a cataclysmic chain of events that tear apart the lives of the residents of Eskibahce. The Sultan declares a holy war against the invaders. The Muslims are conscripted as soldiers and the Christians are sent into labor battalions. The Armenians are evacuated from the region in a death march. The Italians occupy Eskibahce. The Christians are forced to relocate to Greece. Throughout it all, the residents struggle to survive amidst the turmoil.

Although this novel does an exemplary job of bringing alive the history of Turkey, there is far more here than a recounting of historic events. Told in alternating voices, viewpoints, and time periods, this story is panoramic in scope as it follows more than a dozen principal characters and a large cast of secondary ones through a series of interrelated story lines.

There are the childhood friends Karatavuk and Mehmetcik, who are inseparable until war breaks out. At that point, Karatavuk becomes a soldier who participates in the hellish battle of Gallipoli, and Mehmetcik, who is forced into a labor battalion, later defects and becomes a brigand. There is the beautiful Christian girl Philothei, who is betrothed to Ibrahim the goatherd and whose death is foreshadowed at the start of the story. There is the landlord and town protector Rustem Bey, who casts out his adulterous wife and takes a mistress. There are Abdulhamid Hodja and Father Kristoforos, holy men who call each other infidels yet are good friends. Interspersed throughout the story are chapters on the life and career of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, who moves up the military ranks to win the fight for an independent Turkey. There are merchants and craftsmen, madmen and beggars, prostitutes and scholars. Each has a tale to tell. The main focus of the book is really the town of Eskibahce itself, rather than any one character.

De Bernieres provides a rich portrayal of his characters. The language is lyrical, and some of the vignettes have the cadence and color of folk tales. At times the story is painfully sad and sometimes it is humorous. It reflects the full spectrum of compassion and suffering, love and hatred, pride and shame, tolerance and persecution. It brings home the horrors of war and prejudice. Iskander the potter, who likes to quote proverbs, says, "Man is a bird without wings and a bird is a man without sorrows." Birds are present throughout the story. They sing throughout the night, carry letters to the dead, have their voices captured in clay whistles, and live in cages outside the entrance to many homes. The town residents are portrayed as wingless birds that are grounded in the reality of war and unable to flee the turmoil.

This is not a quick read, since it contains a lot of historical background and details about the forces that brought about the transformation of the Ottoman Empire into the Republic of Turkey. There are some Turkish words that are not defined and must be deduced within context (a short glossary would have helped). But the book tells a memorable and masterfully written set of stories that capture the heart and soul of the Turks. It is a powerful epic with an important message. Highly recommended.

Eileen Rieback

41 of 44 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A chance for young Greeks and Turks to reconcile?, August 24, 2004

By	V. DIMITRAKOPOULOS "Victoria" (Paris, France) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I bought this book along with Dido Sotiriou's 1962 "Farewell Anatolia" following their recent review in The Economist. Both books tell the same story: that of two people living in relative peace alongside each other for centuries, of friendships, of common languages and blurring differences between faiths and customs... until the beginning of the 20ieth century. They explain how the Turks and Greeks wounded each other during the 1912-13 Balkan Wars, 1914-18 First World War and 1919-22 Greek campaign.
Birds without Wings is entertaining (short chapters, each from a different character's perspective; great prose), human (more about people than about history), and eye-opening. As a Greek, it made me want to learn more about what has united us with our neighbours, as well as hopeful that our younger generations will develop stronger ties with each others countries.

41 of 45 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars "All wars are fratricide . . . ", August 24, 2004

By	Stephen A. Haines (Ottawa, Ontario Canada) - See all my reviews (TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

This quote from Birds Without Wings sets the book's tone. "All men are brothers" is a theme weary from overuse. Yet de Bernieres manages to portray it in a novel fashion within an unexpected environment. In school most of us learned of "the Sick Man of Europe" - the Ottoman Empire that once wrapped the Eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea. "Corrupt" was the word usually applied. Throughout the 19th Century the Empire was chipped away by rising nationalist forces. Within the Empire's core, however, de Bernieres portrays a land of ethnic mix, kept stable by a tolerance for neighbours. The dominant Muslims appeal to the Orthodox Christians' Mary for aid. The Christians, in turn, recite prayers while prostrating in the Muslim fashion. A Greek teacher writes letters - in Turkish, but written in Greek script. All these elements are skillfully woven in this masterpiece of fictional history.

Yet, as de Bernieres chronicles, this tightly integrated society, typified by a village on Turkey's southwest coast - Eskibahce, was shattered. Riven by hostilities, broken up and rendered a pitiful remnant - why did this idyllic situation fail? Not Ottoman "corruption" but the forces of "European Civilization" intruded on these people's lives in devastating ways. To the people of Eskibahce, all Europeans are the mysterious "Franks". There are German Franks, French Franks, British Franks, even Australian Franks - all Christian, but as Eskibahce will learn, not the Christians they are familiar with. Whatever else these Franks are, they intrude on the Ottoman society and politics. The Empires built in Europe during the 19th Century, chipping at the Ottoman hegemony have now erupted into a Great War. Eskibahce's sons go off to fight, but the demands of war prove greater than simply acquiring cannon fodder. "It was an age when everybody wanted an empire", de Bernieres writes, undertaken with no thought to the cost.

De Bernieres uses a full stage of characters to weave his story of two decades of tumult and change. Few are admirable, but all intensely human - birds without wings. Rustem Bey, a Muslim landlord, travels in search of a replacement "wife" to portray the ways of Ottoman cities. A Muslim boy - inevitably - is stationed in Gallipoli. Through his eyes we are given an uncompromising picture of war's horrors. And its lighter moments. Philothei, a beautiful baby, becomes lovelier with maturity. It's symptomatic of the author's sense of irony that her beauty brings demands to veil her face - even though she's Christian. All the women then adopt the veil to pretend beauty. A potter saves needed money to buy a gun - for what purpose? One figure, however, pervades this story - Mustapha Kamal. He will change the Ottoman Empire into the nation of Turkey. In so doing, everything Eskibahce represents is swept away with devastating results.

With a string of excellent writings to his credit, de Bernieres has here produced a masterpiece. It takes immense skill to create a continuum from so many and varied parts, yet he achieves it admirably. "Where does it all begin?", he asks. The book is a response to the query, but not an answer. War, the great destroyer, has many causes and unexpected results. The Ottoman Empire is transformed into Turkey, a more easily identified entity - a whole derived from parts. In Eskibahce, the effect is schism, disaffection and dispersal, leavened by compassion and generosity. Are there winners, or merely survivors? [stephen a. haines - Ottawa, Canada]