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Crescent and Star: Turkey Between Two Worlds Paperback – September 16, 2008

by Stephen Kinzer (Author)
4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 215 ratings
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"A sharp, spirited appreciation of where Turkey stands now, and where it may head." ―Carlin Romano, The Philadelphia Inquirer

In the first edition of this widely praised book, Stephen Kinzer made the convincing claim that Turkey was the country to watch -- poised between Europe and Asia, between the glories of its Ottoman past and its hopes for a democratic future, between the dominance of its army and the needs of its civilian citizens, between its secular expectations and its Muslim traditions.

In this newly revised edition of Crescent and Star, he adds much important new information on the many exciting transformations in Turkey's government and politics that have kept it in the headlines, and also shows how recent developments in both American and European policies (and not only the war in Iraq) have affected this unique and perplexing nation.

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  1. Print length
    288 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Farrar, Straus and Giroux
  4. Publication date
    September 16, 2008
  5. Dimensions
    5.5 x 0.65 x 8.25 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    0374531404
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0374531409
  8. See all details
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Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
215 global ratings

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Customers say

Customers find the book insightful and well-researched. They describe the writing style as easy to read and engaging. The narrative captures their interest with personal perspectives. Readers appreciate the historical account and dynamics that shaped the country. The visual style portrays the nation vividly and provides an impressionistic portrait of a hopeful contrast.

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Knowledge of turkeyWriting styleStorytellingHistoryVisual style
46 customers mention "Knowledge of turkey"46 positive0 negative

Customers find the book provides a good understanding of Turkey's issues today. They say it's well-researched and insightful. The writing is vivid, and the subject is presented in a balanced way. Readers appreciate learning more about the country and its history from the revolution in 1923 to the new modern era.

"This book presents a mostly balanced description of Turkish politics and how history and politics affects everyday life in Turkey...." Read more

"...Moreover, like Kinzer's other books, this one is based on excellent research and much personal observation, and it'well written and entertaining as..." Read more

"...The book also has many charming and illuminating anecdotes from Kinzer's many years of exploring Turkey - and those made me envious, as I have..." Read more

"...A well done analysis and a good read." Read more

26 customers mention "Writing style"26 positive0 negative

Customers find the writing style engaging and easy to read. They appreciate the author's direct language and personal anecdotes that highlight the chapters' themes. The book provides a clear, concise understanding of Turkey's past and present.

"...The author effectively personalizes issues that are difficult to grasp in the abstract...." Read more

"...The book is extremely engaging and well written...." Read more

"...based on excellent research and much personal observation, and it'well written and entertaining as well...." Read more

"...Kinzer writes well as both a journalist and former resident of Turkey, ending each chapter with a well-chosen and well written personal anecdote..." Read more

15 customers mention "Storytelling"15 positive0 negative

Customers find the storytelling engaging and entertaining. They appreciate the personal perspective and short mezes that keep them interested. The narrative provides a good introduction to Turkey and its people. While the book is opinionated, it's clear and easy to read.

"...The book is extremely engaging and well written...." Read more

"...solid cultural and historical understanding of Turkey to produce a fascinating, even spellbinding text on the country's ongoing dilemma, alternately..." Read more

"...Fun to read. Clearly written. Good introduction. Mr. Kinzer has a lot of love for Turkey but this doesn't cloud his clear observations...." Read more

"...Pick this book up and get engulfed into an amazing story- a true story..." Read more

10 customers mention "History"10 positive0 negative

Customers find the book an excellent account of the political history and culture of Turkey. They say it's a must-read for understanding contemporary Middle-East politics. The book makes the country come alive for them, making it seem intriguing and bustling.

"...It's not a typical politics book, but more of an ex-New York Times Istanbul Bureau Chief's personal quest to come to terms with modern day Turkey...." Read more

"...who wants a better understanding of the world and of this endlessly intriguing country." Read more

"...Turkey unexpectedly (to me) proved to be a thriving and bustling nation, with evident prosperity, but also a clear split between secular liberals..." Read more

"...'s Men" is probably his best book and is must reading for understanding contemporary Middle-East politics. "..." Read more

5 customers mention "Visual style"5 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the book's visual style. They find it an impressionistic portrait of a nation and its people. The book vividly portrays the sights, sounds, and smells of the places Kinzer visits. It is described as an eye-opener for readers who had little knowledge of Turkish history.

"...What he has given us is an impressionistic portrait of a nation that can confuse, but can also be loved, a people that is in the midst of drafting..." Read more

"...The reader will surely sense the tastes, sights, and smells of the places Kinzer knows and portrays so vividly...." Read more

"...It absorbs some of that but is an interesting and hopeful contrast as well...." Read more

"Really an eye opener given that I had so little knowledge of Turkish history before this book...." Read more

Top reviews from the United States

  • Charles D.
    5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent historical analysis
    Reviewed in the United States on October 16, 2024
    Verified Purchase
    This book presents a mostly balanced description of Turkish politics and how history and politics affects everyday life in Turkey. Turkey represents a case study of an Islamic country that is trying to westernize and democraticize. The book helped me to understand Tukey's problems.
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  • David A. Baer
    4.0 out of 5 stars disturbingly beautiful
    Reviewed in the United States on September 12, 2016
    Verified Purchase
    Stephen Kinzer’s rambling walk through the saga of modern Turkey will delight the ordinary reader with an interest in this ‘bridge nation’, while occasionally distressing the historian.

    The dedication of this revised version (‘To the People of Turkey’) signals that Kinzer writes 51aed7hll-_sx331_bo1204203200_from the heart and with affection rather than from the discipline and precision one expects of the historian. This is not a criticism of Kinzer’s formidable work but rather an attempt to define its genre. Those who came to Kinzer’s writing—as this reviewer did—through his superb treatment of the Nicaraguan conflicts (The Blood of Brothers) will anticipate the bent of Kinzer’s method.

    Kinzer, the erstwhile Istanbul Bureau Chief of the New York Times, does not hold back his own views and even prescriptions for the nation that has become his subject. The book’s earliest pages telegraph this. Published in 2008, the book’s introduction observes that ‘(A) new regime has emerged in Turkey that is likely to govern for years to come. This is good, because this regime draws its strength from the people’s will, but it is also disturbing.’ The first chapter’s opening line introduces us to a personal preference: ‘My favorite word in Turkish is istiklal.’

    This is not a bad thing, for Turkey and ‘the Turk’ have been referents of oddness and even incarnate evil for Westerners since Medieval times. A Western writer who can be forthrightly described as turkophile is well placed to be a sympathetic and even accurate guide into this unfamiliar people and its complicated composition. For Western observers—as for the Turks themselves—ambiguities abound: Is Turkey a Middle Eastern country? Or is it European? Is Turkey Muslim? Or secular? Is the nation comprised of a single ethnicity that represents turkishness? Or is Turkey a composite state with large and venerable minorities whose adherence to the national mythology is tenuous?

    Kinzer’s introduction of many of Turkey’s hard-wired enigmas is often channeled through a conversation with one friend or another. This adds an appealing personal hook for the non-expert reader (a group to which this reviewer manifestly belongs). The author effectively personalizes issues that are difficult to grasp in the abstract.

    One emerges from Crescent and Star impressed with several facets of Turkey’s challenges and opportunities that are not independently unique, but that—in combination—profile Turkey as an exceptional nation.

    First, one senses that events of the 20th and 21st century have left Turkey a conflicted nation. The coming to terms with its past has been uneven, leaving the Turks deeply divided as to the answers to difficult questions and even to the degree to which those questions can be permitted consideration. For example, what exactly happened to the Armenians? What would Turkey’s heroic paterfamilias, Ataturk, think of Turkey’s governing Islamic party?

    Second, Turkey oscillates between a xenophobia that was for generations practically prescribed and a longing to join and be respected among the community of nations. A deeply existential variation of this theme turns on the place in the world outside of Turkey’s boundaries in which the nation most naturally belongs. Is it the complex of Muslim nations in its neighborhood? Or is Turkey’s belonging place rather the frustrating and often humiliating European family?

    Third, who are the appropriate custodians of Turkey’s identity and well-being? Is it the generals, who have stepped in ‘to restore order’ so often as to constitute in some minds a backstop against political and cultural experimentation gone wrong? Or is it the Turkish people more generally, their will channeled through democratic process? Or ought trust in the guidance of Islamic centers of guidance be the nation’s modus operandi, no matter how ‘undemocratic’ this option might turn out to be?

    Fourth, what is to be expected of Turkey’s minorities, preeminently the Kurds? Can a stateless people whose population straddles multiple nations in the region be entrusted with the challenge of becoming one component of a Turkish state? Or is independence—and therefore separation from and rebellion against the Turkish state—an irremediable instinct that must be suppressed? And who gets to say? Kurds or non-Kurds? And if Kurds, which ones?

    The mere partial enumeration of these questions shines a light on the appropriateness of the book’s subtitle: Turkey Between Two Worlds. The phrase is patient of more than one application.

    Turkey emerges from Kinzer’s wide-ranging description as a country between. As I write this review eight years after the publication of Crescent and Star’s 2008 revision of a 2001 original, news of a failed coup and the suppression of dissent with which it has been met have barely faded from the front pages. A 2nd revision would doubtless add even further texture and color to the nation’s between-ness.

    But Stephen Kinzer has moved on to other things, and it would would be too much to ask of him a life-long chronicling of Turkey’s wrestlings with its betweens.

    What he has given us is an impressionistic portrait of a nation that can confuse, but can also be loved, a people that is in the midst of drafting its own future, a state that must decide the purpose toward which it governs, a place and a people of disturbing beauty.
    6 people found this helpful
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  • Howard Schulman
    5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent background book to modern Turkey with some reservations (see review)
    Reviewed in the United States on July 4, 2010
    Verified Purchase
    Before saying anything else, you should know that this is an excellent book: five stars. It's not a typical politics book, but more of an ex-New York Times Istanbul Bureau Chief's personal quest to come to terms with modern day Turkey. There are about ten chapters with short "meze" observations in between each chapter. ("meze" is the Turkish term for "appetizer") Each chapter covers a topic, such as the Kurdish problem, the military, religion, Armenians, the foundation of modern Turkey, etc.

    Unfortunately, and I have a hard time saying this because I don't want to give the impression that the book is anything but excellent, but from the very beginning I suspected that Kinzer's book was overly biased in favor of the current Erdogan administration, perhaps because of the author's love of the Turkish people and country, perhaps because of his subconscious desire to maintain journalistic access to Turkish leaders. I frequently found myself wondering what he was not telling the reader. Kinzer clearly makes the case that Erdogan has been good for Turkey, but many have also had serious reservations.

    The book is extremely engaging and well written. The author's own observations based on interviewing and following the key figures in Turkish politics are on target, spot-on. I started reading this book while on vacation in Turkey and frequently found the book explaining to the core things I had observed.

    Only in the very last chapter did Kinzer addresses the concerning Islamic leanings of the Erdogan administration. These concerns are now more important in light of the Gaza flotilla and Erdogan's repudiation of the Israeli Prime Minister at a big international meeting. These events happened after Kinzer updated his book (originally written 2001, substantially revised and updated 2008), but were clearly on the minds of everyone involved when the book was written.
    7 people found this helpful
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  • Sara
    5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent and Entertaining Overview
    Reviewed in the United States on June 25, 2011
    Verified Purchase
    Stephen Kinzer is one of the most perceptive Western journalists around when it comes to 20th- and 21st-century history and politics in Turkey and Iran. There is so much misunderstanding of these two countries and their peoples in the West that Kinzer's books should be required reading in college classes. This book focuses on Turkey, the good and the bad, from the early 20th century until almost the present (with some quick looks back at Turkey's fascinating 4000+ years of ancient history). And it shows both sides of many events in Turkey's past. It also shows why Turkey is becoming more and more a country that the US should better understand and more closely align with. Moreover, like Kinzer's other books, this one is based on excellent research and much personal observation, and it'well written and entertaining as well. Recommended for any one who wants a better understanding of the world and of this endlessly intriguing country.
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  • Marilyn Mortimore
    5.0 out of 5 stars Great
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 24, 2018
    Verified Purchase
    Another very interesting book by this author. Great read
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  • Amazon Customer
    5.0 out of 5 stars Interesting and informative book
    Reviewed in Canada on May 17, 2014
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    Both my husband and I found this book interesting and informative. We didn't know much about Turkey before our recent (and wonderful) trip there.
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  • Andreas Baer
    5.0 out of 5 stars Superanalyse der modernen Türkei
    Reviewed in Germany on August 7, 2005
    Verified Purchase
    Dieses Buch wird jeden erfreuen, der eine profunde Analyse der modernen Türkei sucht. Der Autor ist amerikanischer Journalist und als Korrespondent nach Istanbul gekommen. Dort hat er einige Jahre verbracht und sich dabei ein Bild der Türkei gebildet. Grundsätzlich sieht Kinzer ein Defizit an echter Demokratie und Rechtsstaatlichkeit, weil zum einen Militärs und Bürokraten, zum anderen Politiker und einflussreiche Kreise kein Interesse an einer echten Öffnung des Landes für Demokratie haben.
    Gleichwohl ist Kinzer der Meinung, dass die Türkei ein Modellstaat für Demokratie, Menschenrechte und einen modernen Islam werden könnte. Er sieht das Land sogar auf einem guten Weg dorthin. Nichtsdestotrotz kommt die Türkei nicht aus dem Griff der sozialen Machtgruppen raus und kämpft sozusagen mit der Modernisierung, die Kemal Atatürk einst durchsetzte und auf den Weg brachte.
    Seine Betrachtungsweise, dass radikale Demokratisierung und Rechtsstaatlichkeit für einen langanhaltenden Modernisierungsschub ausreichen würden, ist durchaus zu kritisieren. Rund 30 Prozent der Türken leben unterhalb der offiziellen Armutsgrenze und immer mehr soziale Gruppen haben nicht mehr den gleichen Zugang zu Bildung und sozialem Aufstieg. Muslimische Gruppierungen streben nach einer gesellschaftlichen Islamisierung und Aufweichung der Westorientierung des Landes. Der Premierminister Erdogan war gar einst selber Islamist und musste dafür eine Haftstrafe verbüssen. Also, ich teile Stephen Kinzers Meinung nicht. Ich würde aber sagen, dass dieses Buch anregend und konsequent die Probleme und Stärken der modernen Türkei analysiert und jeden einzelnen Stern damit verdient hat.
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  • Pukka Sahib
    3.0 out of 5 stars read, but read with care
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 30, 2005
    Verified Purchase
    The author explores several issues of contemporary Turkish history - Atatürk's reforms, the Armenian genocide, the Kurdish question, the role of the military, etc. He writes in a highly readable and informative style. But it is good to keep in mind that he is not a historian, but rather a journalist. That is reflected in the fact that there are some inaccuracies about his references to older history. But its most obvious consequence is that the book is not at all nuanced in its description of what is happening and what according to the author "ought" to happen in Turkey. The author has his own clear opinions on what is right and wrong for Turkey and the Turks and he never hides these. I would say: The book is definitely a good and informative read, but you should keep a critical spirit while reading it.
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