Romantic Communist: The Life and Work of Nazim Hikmet

Book Description

This is the first full-length biography in English of Nazim Hikmet, the Turkish poet and political activist who is one of the greatest literary figures ever to emerge from Turkey. Not only a communist committed to revolution, but a romantic who was passionately in love with his country and his people, Hikmet was repeatedly arrested for his political beliefs and sentenced in 1938 to twenty-eight years imprisonment. Although an international campaign helped to secure his release under an amnesty in 1950, he fled to the Soviet Union in 1951 where he died in 1963 stripped of his Turkish citizenship. This book presents much new material, most of it Turkish and not available to most readers, and the authors have also used interviews with people who were close to Hikmet to illuminate his life. Hikmet's poetry has been skillfully integrated with his personal and political life, and photographs richly illustrate the career and life of a poet whose career forms a microcosm of twentieth-century politics.

Romantic Communist: The Life and Work of Nazim Hikmet. (Book Reviews).(Book Review) (book review): An article from: Arab Studies Quarterly (ASQ)

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Romantic Communist: The Life and Work of Nazim Hikmet. (Book Reviews).(Book Review) (book review): An article from: Arab Studies Quarterly (ASQ)
Arif Dirlik
Manufacturer: Association of Arab-American University Graduates and Institute of Arab Studies
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital
ASIN: B0008DFHHA
Release Date: 2005-07-31

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Arab Studies Quarterly (ASQ), published by Association of Arab-American University Graduates and Institute of Arab Studies on September 22, 2002. The length of the article is 1022 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Romantic Communist: The Life and Work of Nazim Hikmet. (Book Reviews).(Book Review) (book review)
Author: Arif Dirlik
Publication: Arab Studies Quarterly (ASQ) (Refereed)
Date: September 22, 2002
Publisher: Association of Arab-American University Graduates and Institute of Arab Studies
Volume: 24 Issue: 4 Page: 93(3)

Article Type: Book Review

Distributed by Thomson Gale

Book Description

The year is 1989 and Mark Doty's life has reached a state of enviable equilibrium. His reputation as a poet of formidable talent is growing, he enjoys his work as a college professor and, perhaps most importantly, he is deeply in love with his partner of many years, Wally Roberts. The harmonious existence these two men share is shattered, however, when they learn that Wally has tested positive for the HIV virus.

From diagnosis to the initial signs of deterioration to the heartbreaking hour when Wally is released from his body's ruined vessel, Heaven's Coast is an intimate chronicle of love, its hardships, and its innumerable gifts. We witness Doty's passage through the deepest phase of grief -- letting his lover go while keeping him firmly alive in memory and heart -- and, eventually beyond, to the slow reawakening of the possibilities of pleasure. Part memoir, part journal, part elegy for a life of rare communication and beauty, Heaven's Coast evinces the same stunning honesty, resplendent descriptive power and rapt attention to the physical landscape that has won Doty's poetry such attention and acclaim.

Customer Reviews:

Overcoming Loss.......2007-08-06

Heaven's Coast is a book about loss. Mark Doty approaches this topic through the loss of his beloved partner through AIDS, but, to me, this was not a book about AIDS. As some other reviews note, this topic has been covered by others probably more effectively.

First and foremost, Mark Doty is a poet. He views his life through images and metaphors. It is not surprising that he approaches personal loss in this same way? The power of the metaphor is that it is universal. It allows others to enter into the writer's thoughts without actually experience them. In this, Doty is masterful, and he uses this skill with Great power in Heaven's Coast. In doing so, he is able to describe loss - a feeling that is both deeply personal and yet universal. It may not be loss to AIDS - it may be loss of a relationship to addiction, loss of self-control to depression, loss of possessions to natural disasters. But it is all loss. Doty's writings help allow one's humanity to remain pinnacle during the time of loss. It may be submerged, but it is never loss. Looking for that essence of person-ality is what Doty emphasizes, and it is a message that transcends situation and becomes universal. Kudos to Doty for emphasizing this truth through his life story and captivating prose.

5 stars aren't nearly enough.......2007-03-12

Doty's memoir shimmers with love, with joy, with pain, with grief. His prose is as rich and lyrical as his poetry. He invites us into his soul as he describes in unsparing detail his lover's journey through HIV. Doty honors his partner with every word; the love and respect is obvious, as well as the despair that results from knowing what is to come and being totally powerless to prevent it.

This book is certainly a tangible gift from Mark to Wally, but the sheer beauty of the writing is a gift to the reader. I draw no sustenance from the ocean, yet I found myself longing to walk across the dunes of Cape Cod-Doty's use of language is that powerful.

Heaven's Coast should be required reading for all healthcare workers.

A reader is correct. It isn't about Aids........2005-10-21

Nor was it supposed to be a book about AIDS. Doty writes magnificently about the loss of a loved one, and the grief, in its many forms, that follows.

If you want a book about AIDS, don't buy this. If, however, you want a book that honestly portrays one man's experience with devastating loss and how he begins the process of coming through it to the other side, this is the book for you.

A Gorgeous Exploration of Grief...and moving on.......2005-01-14

HEAVEN'S COAST is Mark Doty's his first prose book and a stirring and stunning memoir of his year of grief following the death of his lover of a dozen years Wally Roberts. With this book Doty has created a genuine masterpiece. It is a brilliant and accessible memoir conveying sorrow without cliché and making sense of death through the beauty of writing. Death is no longer simply tragic but attains a variety of meanings that result in new levels of acceptance and understanding. His powerful emotional exactitude is culled from a brilliant mastery of language and a precise usage of metaphor. The combination transforms human loss into a redemptive art form. HEAVEN'S COAST is one of the most moving, beautiful, and poignant books to emerge on AIDS and more importantly on loss and grief.

this book is not about AIDS.......2003-12-06

AIDS is a tragedy for the individual who experiences it, and for those who love them. But even if you have suffered at its hands, no-one should let you off the hook when you banalise it like this. 'Heaven's Coast' is over-written, self-important and embarrassing. I can only suppose that those who praise this writer's use of language come from the "more metaphors=more emotion" school of literature he favours, but like all self-indulgent writing, the effect of Doty's style is to cheat the genuine feeling behind it of a distinctive vocabulary, and to cheapen the suffering it depicts. There's something distasteful about watching someone using illness as an excuse to strike postures as hollow and self-regarding as this: 'Is this my work? To point at the world and say: look, see how darkly it sparkles?' From the precious rhetorical question to that faux-profound dark/light inversion, this is a typical instance of the book's extended masterclass in bad writing. If these were the outpourings of someone under the pressure of grief, they might be excusable, but Doty has worked hard to produce writing this overloaded: 'Wild, glimmering, watery horizons of sun, the watchful seals and shimmered flurries of snow seem to me to have more to do with the life of my spirit.' Even a teenager who'd just been taught about assonance and alliteration would balk at that sentence. This book, despite the horrors it sometimes documents, ends up reading like one long, shrill assertion of its own marvellous sensitivity, inviting the reader to congratulate themselves on their special ability to share in it. Sometimes bad writing is also morally questionable, and this is one of those times.

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Heaven's Coast A Memoir
Mark Doty
Manufacturer: Harper Collins
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

Public Health | Administration & Policy | Medicine | Subjects | Books

AIDS & HIV | Diseases | Medicine | Subjects | Books
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Heaven Is a Beautiful Place: A Memoir of the South Carolina Coast

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Second time around better than the first.
Fantastic Book
Better Than Fiction; A Fabulous, Page-Turning Read
Genevieve Makes Us All More Beautiful
Heaven is a Beautiful Place

Heaven Is a Beautiful Place: A Memoir of the South Carolina Coast
Genevieve C. Peterkin , and William P. Baldwin
Manufacturer: University of South Carolina Press
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Customer Reviews:

Second time around better than the first........2006-07-31

I picked this book up again yesterday having read it several years ago. I just finished a few moments ago and felt compelled to leave this review.

This book is a true delight. To those of us who have the low country in our blood, this book captures it all. I loved it even more the second time around. And even knowing about the tragedies that Mrs. Peterkin has endured I still cried. She is such a fine example of the indomitable southern woman or I guess I should say "Lady". I truly hope that one day I will have the distinct pleasure of meeting her.

My only regret is the book just ends too soon and too fast. I wish there were a sequel, I would love to know what she has been up to. And I would so dearly love a print of the watercolor that is on the front of the book.

Fantastic Book.......2006-06-09

The South Carolina Coast is one of the best places. It's the south at it's best & hasn't surcumb to the Northern nonsense.

Better Than Fiction; A Fabulous, Page-Turning Read.......2001-03-03

I was not going to read this book, figuring it was yet another trivial book by a local person with famous connections (Julia Peterkin, a novelist who won a Pulitzer, was the author's mother-in-law). Was I wrong! This is one of the most riveting books I have ever read. Peterkin is a gifted storyteller with amazing stories to tell, stories that are right up there with the best fiction. I want to compare her to Flannery O'Connor, to Nabokov, to Kipling, to Dickens, to any fiction writer whose stories linger with us for the rest of our lives. Yet these powerful stories are true and open a window into recent times. Some of her stories prove that truth is stranger than fiction. They are in turns hilarious, outrageous, tragic, moving and illuminating.

Please, get this book. I don't know Peterkin but I wish I did. I picked up the book by accident and never put it down till I finished. Beg, borrow or steal it, whatever it takes to get it in your hands.

Genevieve Makes Us All More Beautiful.......2000-10-11

When I read Heaven Is A Beautiful Place, I felt that I was sitting on Genevieve's front porch overlooking Murrells Inlet and listening to her tell the stories. I have heard the Peterkins and Chandlers tell wonderful stories most of my life and this book truly captures their collective spirit. I finished the book at 35,000 feet over the Atlantic, but it seemed to me she was there relating the story of the loss of three of those closest to her. In spite of many adversities she has always worked to make the world a beter place.

Heaven is a Beautiful Place.......2000-09-25

I have heard many of these stories through the years but was thrilled when I heard she was going to compile them in chronological order. I loved the way Genevieve told her life stories in a way that not only did I learn about the wonderful people in her life but the history of the area she loves so much. One of the many things I admire about Genevieve is that she lives her life and does not sit on the sidelines and continues to do so today. She has touched many hearts, mine included.

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HEAVEN'S COAST. A MEMOIR.
Mark Doty
Manufacturer: HarperCollins
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000LQLXMM

Heaven Is a Beautiful Place: A Memoir of the South Carolina Coast. (Books). (book review): An article from: The Antioch Review

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Heaven Is a Beautiful Place: A Memoir of the South Carolina Coast. (Books). (book review): An article from: The Antioch Review
Carolyn Maddux
Manufacturer: Antioch Review, Inc.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

Book Description

This digital document is an article from The Antioch Review, published by Antioch Review, Inc. on June 22, 2002. The length of the article is 309 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Heaven Is a Beautiful Place: A Memoir of the South Carolina Coast. (Books). (book review)
Author: Carolyn Maddux
Publication: The Antioch Review (Refereed)
Date: June 22, 2002
Publisher: Antioch Review, Inc.
Volume: 60 Issue: 3 Page: 530(1)

Article Type: Book Review

Distributed by Thomson Gale

Book Description

"This splendid book brings together the beauty of the earth and the shame of our insults."-James Lovelock, environmentalist and author of The Gaia Theory

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Our Fragile World celebrates the beauty of our world-and its diversity-through extra-ordinary photographs. Over 150 stunning images from the world's best photographers illustrate the many ways in which nature and human life share the planet-sometimes in balance, sometimes not.

From nature's delicate coral reefs to the human-made ecosystem of rice paddies, from the horrible beauty of the ozone hole to the innocent delight of playful penguins, these photos celebrate the wonder of the world we have and cannot afford to lose.

The compelling photos make you look twice and think again. It's a beautiful, complex, fragile planet: we can adapt and learn, working with nature to protect it.

Includes work from some of the world's leading photographers, and many images featured in the United Nations Environment Programme photography competition.

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Biosphere: Ecosystems and Biodiversity Loss (Our Fragile Planet)

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