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could regard the world like a blind man. At the age of sixty-seven he proved his

point by dashing off a horse that came to the tip of his brush without so

much as a glance at the paper, even as his eyes remained all the while open

and fixed on the page. At the end of this artistic ceremony for which Miran

Shah had deaf musicians play lutes and mute storytellers recite stories to

support the legendary master’s efforts, the splendid horse that Black Veli had

drawn was compared at length with other horses he’d made: There was no

difference whatsoever among them, much to Miran Shah’s irritation;

thereafter, the legendary master declared that a miniaturist possessed of

talent, regardless of whether his eyes are open or closed, will always and only

see horses in one way, that is, the way that Allah perceives them. And among

great master miniaturists, there is no difference between the blind and the

sighted: The hand would always draw the same horse because there was as yet

no such thing as the Frankish innovation called “style.” The horses made by

the great master Black Veli have been imitated by all Muslim miniaturists for

110 years. As for Black Veli himself, after the defeat of Abu Said and the

dispersal of his workshop, he moved from Samarkand to Kazvin, where two

years later he was condemned for his spiteful attempts to refute the verse in

the Glorious Koran that declares, “The blind and the seeing are not equal.” For

this, he was first blinded, then killed by young Nizam Shah’s soldiers.

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I was on the verge of telling a third story, describing to the pretty-eyed

calligrapher’s apprentice how the great master Bihzad had blinded himself,

how he never wanted to leave Herat, why he never painted again after being

taken forcibly to Tabriz, how a miniaturist’s style was really the style of the

workshop in which he worked and other tales I’d heard from Master Osman,

but I became preoccupied with the storyteller. How had I known that he was

going to tell Satan’s story tonight?

I had the urge to say, “It was Satan who first said ”I‘! It was Satan who

adopted a style. It was Satan who separated East from West.“

I closed my eyes and drew Satan on the storyteller’s rough sheet of paper as

my heart desired. As I drew, the storyteller and his assistant, other artists and

curious onlookers giggled and goaded me on.

Pray, do you think I have my own style, or do I owe it to the wine?

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I, SATAN

I am fond of the smell of red peppers frying in olive oil, rain falling into a calm

sea at dawn, the unexpected appearance of a woman at an open window,

silences, thought and patience. I believe in myself, and, most of the time, pay

no mind to what’s been said about me. Tonight, however, I’ve come to this

coffeehouse to set my miniaturist and calligrapher brethren straight about

certain gossip, lies and rumors.

Of course, because I’m the one speaking, you’re already prepared to believe

the exact opposite of what I say. But you’re smart enough to sense that the

opposite of what I say is not always true, and though you might doubt me,

you’re astute enough to take an interest in my words: You’re well aware that

my name, which appears in the Glorious Koran fifty-two times, is one of the

most frequently cited.

All right then, let me begin with God’s book, the Glorious Koran.

Everything about me in there is the truth. Let it be known that when I say this,

I do so with the utmost humility. For there’s also the issue of style. It has

always caused me great pain that I’m belittled in the Glorious Koran. But this

pain is my way of life. This is simply the way it is.

It’s true, God created man before the eyes of us angels. Then He wanted us

to prostrate ourselves before this creation. Yes, it happened the way it’s written

in “The Heights” chapter: While all the other angels bowed before man, I

refused. I reminded all that Adam was made from mud, whereas I was created

from fire, a superior element as all of you are familiar. So I didn’t bow before

man. And God found my behavior, well, “proud.”

“Lower yourself from these heavens,” He said. “It’s beyond the likes of you

to scheme for greatness here.”

“Permit me to live until Judgment Day,” I said, “until the dead arise.”

He granted His permission. I promised that during this entire time I would

tempt the descendents of Adam, who’d been the cause of my punishment, and

He said He’d send to Hell those I’d successfully corrupted. I don’t have to tell

you that we’ve each remained true to his word. I have nothing more to say

about the matter.

As some will claim, at that time Almighty God and I made a pact. According

to them, I was helping to test the Almighty’s subjects by attempting to destroy

their faith: The good, possessed of sound judgment, would not be led astray,

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while the evil, giving into their carnal desires, would sin, to later fill the depths

of Hell. Therefore, what I did was quite important: If all men went to Heaven,

no one would ever be frightened, and the world and its governments could

never function on virtue alone; for in our world evil is as necessary as virtue

and sin as necessary as rectitude. Given that I am to thank for the genesis of

Allah’s worldly order—with His permission no less (why else would He allow

me to live until Judgment Day?)—to be branded “evil” and never be granted

my due is my hidden troment. Men like the mystic Mansur, the wool carder,

or the famous Imam Gazzali’s younger brother Ahmet Gazzali, have taken this

line of reasoning so far as to conclude in their writings that if the sins I caused

are actually committed through God’s permission and will, then they are what

God desires; furthermore, they maintain that good and evil do not exist

because everything emerges from God, and even I am a part of Him.

Some of these mindless men have quite appropriately been burned to death

with their books. Of course, good and evil do exist, and the responsibility for

drawing a line between the two falls to each of us. I am not Allah, God forbid,

and I was not the one who planted such absurdities into the heads of these

dimwits; they came up with it all by themselves.

This brings me to my second complaint: I am not the source of all the evil

and sin in the world. Many people sin out of their own blind ambition, lust,

lack of willpower, baseness, and most often, out of their own idiocy without

any instigation, deception or temptation on my part. However absurd the

efforts of certain learned mystics to absolve me of any evil might be, so too is

the assumption that I am the source of all of it, which also contradicts the

Glorious Koran. I’m not the one who tempts every fruit monger who craftily

foists rotten apples upon his customers, every child who tells a lie, every

fawning sycophant, every old man who has obscene daydreams or every boy

who jacks off. Even the Almighty couldn’t find anything evil in passing wind

or jacking off. Sure, I work very hard so you might commit grave sins. But

some hojas claim that all of you who gape, sneeze or even fart are my dupes,

which tells me they haven’t understood me in the least.

Let them misunderstand you, so you can dupe them all the more easily, you

might suggest. True. But let me remind you, I have my pride, which is what

caused me to fall out with the Almighty in the first place. Even though I can

assume every imaginable form, and though it’s been recorded in numerous

books tens of thousands of times that I’ve successfully tempted the pious,

especially in the lust-kindling guise of a beautiful woman, can the miniaturist

brethren before me tonight please explain why they persist in picturing me as

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a misshapen, horned, long-tailed and gruesome creature with a face covered

with protruding moles?

Like so, we arrive at the heart of the matter: figurative painting. An Istanbul

street mob incited by a preacher whose name I won’t mention so he won’t

bother you later on, condemns the following as being contrary to the word of

God: the calling of the azan like a song; the gathering of men in dervish lodges,

sitting in each other’s laps, and chanting with abandon to the accompaniment

of musical instruments; and the drinking of coffee. I’ve heard that some of the

miniaturists among us who fear this preacher and his mob claim that I’m the

one behind all this painting in the Frankish style. For centuries, countless

accusations have been leveled at me, but none so far from the truth.

Let’s start from the beginning. Everybody gets caught up in my provoking

Eve to eat of the forbidden fruit and forgets about how this whole matter

began. No, it doesn’t begin with my hubris before the Almighty, either. Before

anything else, there’s the matter of His presenting man to us and expecting us

to bow down to him, which met with my quite appropriate and decisive

refusal—though the other angels obeyed. Do you think it fitting that, after

creating me from fire, He require me to bow before man, whom He created

out of the crudest mud? Oh my brethren, speak the truth of your conscience.

All right, then, I know you’ve been thinking about it and fear that anything

said here will not just remain between us: He will hear it all and one day He’ll

call you to account. Fine, never mind why He’s provided you with that

conscience in the first instance; I agree, you’re justified in being afraid, and I’ll

forget about this question and the mud-versus-fire debate. But there’s

something I’ll never forget—yes indeed, something I’ll always be proud of: I

never bowed down before man.

This, however, is precisely what the new European masters are doing, and

they’re not satisfied with merely depicting and displaying every single detail

down to the eye color, complexion, curvy lips, forehead wrinkles, rings and

disgusting ear hair of gentlemen, priests, wealthy merchants and even

women—including the lovely shadows that fall between their breasts. These

artists also dare to situate their subjects in the center of the page, as if man

were meant to be worshiped, and display these portraits like idols before

which we should prostrate ourselves. Is man important enough to warrant

being drawn in every detail, including his shadow? If the houses on a street

were rendered according to man’s false perception that they gradually

diminish in size as they recede into the distance, wouldn’t man then

effectively be usurping Allah’s place at the center of the world? Well, Allah,

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almighty and omnipotent, would know better than I. But surely it’s absurd on

the face of it to credit me with the idea of these portraits; I, who having

refused to prostrate myself before man suffered untold pain and isolation; I,

who fell from God’s grace to become the subject of curses. It would be more

reasonable to hold me responsible, as some mullahs and preachers do, for all

the children who play with themselves and everyone who farts.

I have one last comment on this subject, but my words aren’t for men who

can’t think beyond their eagerness to show off, their carnal desires, lust for

money or other absurd passions! Only God, in His infinite wisdom, will

understand me: Was it not You who instilled man with pride by making the

angels bow before him? Now they regard themselves as Your angels were made

to regard them; men are worshiping themselves, placing themselves at the

center of the world. Even your most devoted servants want to be depicted in

the style of the Frankish masters. I know it as well as I know my own name

that this narcissism will end in their forgetting You entirely. And I’m the one

who’ll be blamed.

How might I convince you that I don’t take all of this to heart? Naturally,

by standing firmly on my own two feet despite centuries of merciless stonings,

curses, damnings and denouncements. If only my angry and shallow enemies,

who never tire of condemning me, would remember that it was the Almighty

Himself who granted me life until Judgment Day, while allotting them no

more than sixty or seventy years. If I were to advise them that they could

extend this period by drinking coffee, I know quite well that some, because it

was Satan speaking, would do the exact opposite and refuse coffee entirely, or

worse yet, stand on their heads and try pouring it into their asses.

Don’t laugh. It’s not the content, but the form of thought that counts. It’s

not what a miniaturist paints, but his style. Yet these things should be subtle. I

was going to conclude with a love story, but it’s gotten quite late. The honey-

tongued master storyteller who’s given me voice tonight promises to tell this

story of love when he hangs up the picture of a woman the day after

tomorrow, on Wednesday night.

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I, SHEKURE

I dreamed that my father was telling me incomprehensible things, and it was

so terrifying that I woke up. Shevket and Orhan were clinging tightly to me on

either side, and their warmth made me sweat. Shevket had his hand on my

stomach. Orhan was resting his sweaty head on my bosom. Somehow, I was

able to get out of bed and leave the room without waking them.

I crossed the wide hallway and silently opened Black’s door. In the light cast

by my candle, I couldn’t see him, only the edge of his white mattress which lay

like a shrouded body in the middle of the dark, cold room. The candlelight

seemed unable to reach the mattress.