Media Center: 'Silent House' by Orhan Pamuk

WHO: Orhan Pamuk

WHAT:
SILENT HOUSE, a novel

WHEN:
Published by Knopf October 12, 2012

WHERE:
Set in a Istanbul

WHY:
“A multi-faceted panorama distinguished by Pamuk’s customary intellectual richness and breath.” —KIRKUS REVIEWS

In an old mansion in Cennethisar, a former fishing village near Istanbul, a widow, Fatma, awaits the annual summer visit of her grandchildren. She has lived in the village for decades, ever since her husband, an idealistic young doctor, ran afoul of the sultan’s grand vizier and arrived to serve the poor fishermen. Now mostly bedridden, she is attended by her constant servant Recep, a dwarf—and the doctor’s illegitimate son.
Though eagerly anticipated, Fatma’s grandchildren bring little consolation. The eldest, Faruk, a dissipated historian, wallows in alcohol; his sensitive leftist sister, Nilgün, has yet to discover the real-life consequences of highminded politics; and Metin, a high school nerd, tries to keep up with the lifestyle of his spoiled society schoolmates.
But it is Recep’s nephew Hasan, a high school dropout, lately fallen in with right-wing nationalists, who will draw the visiting family into the growing political cataclysm issuing from Turkey’s tumultuous century-long struggle for modernity.

Translated from the Turkish by Robert Finn.

Media Resources:
About the book | Author bio | Reader’s Guide | Download the jacket or the author photo | Listen to the RH Audiobook

Publicist for this title:
Lena Khidritskaya | 212-572-2103 | lkhidritskaya@randomhouse.com