cloud atlas : Oran Pamuk

[Joseph Tracy]

Mark wrote
(currently reading Pamuk's _My Name is Red_: any thoughts on this
book, or this writer, from anyone? Can't recall that I've read his
name a lot here...)

I design and make stained glass windows(www.brooksideglassworks.com)  and several years ago was commissioned by an Iranian couple to make a widow based on Persian miniatures.  I  bought and checked out some books on the subject which initiated a continuing fascination with this branch of Middle Eastern art.

So when I saw "My Name is Red"in my local library I got it. I had no Idea what a beautifully crafted work of fiction I was in for: the personification of the colors as  characters at work in the  psyche, the way the different voices seem to build up a lenslike clarity to see into the story and the world. As an artist/craftperson involved in the difficult and painstaking details of a demanding medieval craft I think Pamuk got the interior and exterior lives of the characters correct to a fine degree.  Also, the clear delineation of the fascination/ disagreement between Islamic culture and Eurpean culture and the resulting alchemy are a genuine tonic for the thick headed culture wars of today.  I think this writer may be due for a Nobel prize, but definitely a major talent. He has something new I wish to read.

2 of my own works were inspired by this reading.  One, called "Race ", is on my website www.brooksideglassworks.com/Page_16.html

Joseph Tracy
brook7 at earthlink.net
Why Wait? Move to EarthLink.
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