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Muskets and Mustachios: The Turkic World
Book Review of "Sons of the Conquerors: The Rise of the Turkic World," by Hugh Pope
The Economist
May 21, 2005
The emergence of a clutch of newly independent Muslim Turkic states
following the collapse of the Soviet empire in 1991 stirred up
an intense, if short-lived, interest in the Turkic presence that
stretches from the outer edges of China all the way to the Balkans. At
its core lay Turkey whose ready, if wobbly, democracy, its free-market
economy and its own brand of moderate Islam, western strategists hoped,
could serve as a model.
Fired by visions of leading this Turkic world, imams, entrepreneurs
and language teachers all poured into the former Soviet republics. But
their fervour was soon tempered by Russia's continued political and
cultural grip over its one-time colonies. With the exception of tiny
landlocked Kirgizstan, each of these countries is still ruled by its
corrupt former communist dictator, its every potential unfulfilled.
Indeed, modern Turks often seem to have more in common with their
Christian Greek neighbours than they do with their ethnic cousins
in Azerbaijan.
Hugh Pope, a veteran Istanbul-based correspondent of the Wall
Street Journal and co-author with Nicole Pope of an unrivalled
history of modern Turkey, "Turkey Unveiled", might agree. Yet, in
his ambitious new book, "Sons of the Conquerors", Mr Pope seeks to
unearth the common strands that link the 140m Turkic speakers across
the globe. In a quest that takes him from the grim battlefronts
of Armenian-controlled Nagorno-Karabakh in Azerbaijan to secret
encounters with Turkic-speaking Uighur nationalists in China, he has
produced the most comprehensive work on the Turks today. His book
is also very timely. As Turkey prepares to open membership talks
with the European Union later this year, Mr Pope's affectionate yet
often critical gaze should help redefine the Shorter Oxford English
dictionary's description of the Turk as "a cruel, savage, rigorous
or tyrannical man".
Part-travelogue, part-history and part-political analysis, "Sons of
the Conquerors" overflows with hilarious anecdotes and distinctive
characters that only someone who speaks Turkish, Farsi and Arabic
as effortlessly as Mr Pope could dig up. There is the pan-Turkist
Azerbaijani doctor, Timur Agridag, who milks Caucasus vipers; Aslan
Abashidze, the president of the tiny autonomous republic of Ajaria, who
believes his model of New York's Statue of Liberty is an image of the
Virgin Mary; and Nadya Yuguseva, who is a witch-doctor cum priestess
from Altay. "She wore a splendid, tall, round hat of reddish fur. I
complimented her on it, and she told me it was a traditional shaman
artefact made from the front paws of 12 foxes," recalls the author.
So what are the essential characteristics that bind such Turks? The
answer is not so clear, Mr Pope readily admits, as he charts their
beginnings from the nomad armies who once conquered the Byzantine
Empire, large chunks of Europe and the Middle East. Some are not
Sunni but Shia Muslims, as in Iran; many in Soviet Central Asia are
atheists. They often speak mutually unintelligible dialects.
Even so, Mr Pope sees some important and unmistakable similarities:
"An engaging bluntness, loyalty to family, fearlessness and a rash
love of risk," that makes him hopeful for the future. Yet, the Turks'
"ignorant pride can often give way to bombastic, insecure assertions
of superiority." Moreover, the "constant struggle in many Turkic
hearts pits a love of authoritarian rule against a belief that the
pleasures and profits in life are to be gained from bypassing the
law in the manner of the heroic, mustachioed brigand."
Book Review of "Sons of the Conquerors: The Rise of the Turkic World," by Hugh Pope
The Economist
May 21, 2005
The emergence of a clutch of newly independent Muslim Turkic states
following the collapse of the Soviet empire in 1991 stirred up
an intense, if short-lived, interest in the Turkic presence that
stretches from the outer edges of China all the way to the Balkans. At
its core lay Turkey whose ready, if wobbly, democracy, its free-market
economy and its own brand of moderate Islam, western strategists hoped,
could serve as a model.
Fired by visions of leading this Turkic world, imams, entrepreneurs
and language teachers all poured into the former Soviet republics. But
their fervour was soon tempered by Russia's continued political and
cultural grip over its one-time colonies. With the exception of tiny
landlocked Kirgizstan, each of these countries is still ruled by its
corrupt former communist dictator, its every potential unfulfilled.
Indeed, modern Turks often seem to have more in common with their
Christian Greek neighbours than they do with their ethnic cousins
in Azerbaijan.
Hugh Pope, a veteran Istanbul-based correspondent of the Wall
Street Journal and co-author with Nicole Pope of an unrivalled
history of modern Turkey, "Turkey Unveiled", might agree. Yet, in
his ambitious new book, "Sons of the Conquerors", Mr Pope seeks to
unearth the common strands that link the 140m Turkic speakers across
the globe. In a quest that takes him from the grim battlefronts
of Armenian-controlled Nagorno-Karabakh in Azerbaijan to secret
encounters with Turkic-speaking Uighur nationalists in China, he has
produced the most comprehensive work on the Turks today. His book
is also very timely. As Turkey prepares to open membership talks
with the European Union later this year, Mr Pope's affectionate yet
often critical gaze should help redefine the Shorter Oxford English
dictionary's description of the Turk as "a cruel, savage, rigorous
or tyrannical man".
Part-travelogue, part-history and part-political analysis, "Sons of
the Conquerors" overflows with hilarious anecdotes and distinctive
characters that only someone who speaks Turkish, Farsi and Arabic
as effortlessly as Mr Pope could dig up. There is the pan-Turkist
Azerbaijani doctor, Timur Agridag, who milks Caucasus vipers; Aslan
Abashidze, the president of the tiny autonomous republic of Ajaria, who
believes his model of New York's Statue of Liberty is an image of the
Virgin Mary; and Nadya Yuguseva, who is a witch-doctor cum priestess
from Altay. "She wore a splendid, tall, round hat of reddish fur. I
complimented her on it, and she told me it was a traditional shaman
artefact made from the front paws of 12 foxes," recalls the author.
So what are the essential characteristics that bind such Turks? The
answer is not so clear, Mr Pope readily admits, as he charts their
beginnings from the nomad armies who once conquered the Byzantine
Empire, large chunks of Europe and the Middle East. Some are not
Sunni but Shia Muslims, as in Iran; many in Soviet Central Asia are
atheists. They often speak mutually unintelligible dialects.
Even so, Mr Pope sees some important and unmistakable similarities:
"An engaging bluntness, loyalty to family, fearlessness and a rash
love of risk," that makes him hopeful for the future. Yet, the Turks'
"ignorant pride can often give way to bombastic, insecure assertions
of superiority." Moreover, the "constant struggle in many Turkic
hearts pits a love of authoritarian rule against a belief that the
pleasures and profits in life are to be gained from bypassing the
law in the manner of the heroic, mustachioed brigand."