In an interview on Turkish Politics

Your next book, My Grandmother, is about the Armenian genocide. Some of the reviews made it sound almost Anne Frank-like, a very moving book that anyone might want to pick up.

That’s exactly right. It’s a very empathetic, straightforward read. It’s short. It gives an insight into the ethnic origins of Turkey today that no one has been talking about until very recently. A lot of Armenians were deported and a lot were massacred, but a lot also stayed behind in Turkish families. This book is about someone discovering, quite unexpectedly, that her grandmother is one of these people. She’s been a good Muslim all her life, because when Armenians joined these families, they became Muslims of Armenian heritage and culture, believing in Islam, but also making Armenian cakes on Armenian religious days.

I have a number of friends who have discovered that their grandmothers were not what anyone thought they were. Muslim in culture and practice, but who had come from a very different place. It’s an aspect of Turkey that no one has wanted to talk about because of the idea that ‘We’re all Turks’ and ‘We’ll only be safe if we’re all the same.’ But suddenly people are discovering that it’s OK to be different. Perhaps we should admit that, in the east of Turkey, a lot of people are of mixed ancestry.

The power of this book is the relationship between a granddaughter and a grandmother, and how the story suddenly spilled out. It’s been very well translated by Maureen Freely, which makes it an easy read. (Freely also translates Orhan Pamuk.) Some people have criticised her translations for making it too easy for people to read, but the fact is, she has made a very accessible book of it.