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calligraphers of Tabriz by making books for pashas, wealthy Istanbulites and

patrons in the provinces. All these artists, I learned, were impoverished and

overcome by the futility of their lot. Not only in Tabriz, but in Mashhad and

Aleppo, many miniaturists had abandoned working on books and begun

making odd single-leaf pictures—curiosities that would please European

travelers—even obscene drawings. Rumor has it that the illuminated

manuscript Shah Abbas presented to Our Sultan during the Tabriz peace treaty

has already been taken apart so its pages could be used for another book.

Supposedly, the Emperor of Hindustan, Akbar, was throwing so much money

around for a large new book that the most gifted illustrators of Tabriz and

Kazvin quit what they were doing and flocked to his palace.

As he told me all of this, he pleasantly interjected other stories as well; for

example, he described with a smile the entertaining story of a Mehdi forgery

or the frenzy that erupted among the Uzbeks when the idiot prince sent to

them by the Safavids as a hostage to peace fell feverishly ill and dropped dead

within three days. Even so, I could tell from the shadow that fell across his face

that the dilemma to which neither of us referred, but which troubled us both,

had yet to be resolved.

Naturally, Black, like every young man who frequented our house or heard

what others had to say about us, or who knew about my beautiful daughter,

Shekure, from hearsay, had fallen in love with her. Perhaps I didn’t consider it

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dangerous enough to warrant my attention back then, but everyone—

including many who’d never laid eyes on her—fell in love with my daughter,

that belle of belles. Black’s affliction was the overwhelming passion of an ill-

fated youth who had free access to our house, who was accepted and well liked

in our home and who had the opportunity actually to see Shekure. He did not

bury his love, as I hoped he would, but made the mistake of revealing his

extreme passion to my daughter.

As a result, he was forced to quit our house completely.

I assumed that Black now also knew how three years after he’d left

Istanbul, my daughter married a spahi cavalryman, at the height of her

loveliness, and that this soldier, having fathered two boys but still bereft of any

common sense, had gone off on a campaign never to return again. No one had

heard from the cavalryman in four years. I gathered he was aware of this, not

only because such gossip spreads fast in Istanbul, but because during the

silences that passed between us, I felt he’d learned the whole story long ago,

judging by the way he looked into my eyes. Even at this moment, as he casts

an eye at the Book of the Soul, which stands open on the folding X-shaped

reading stand, I know he’s listening for the sounds of her children running

through the house; I know he’s aware that my daughter has returned here to

her father’s house with her two sons.

I’ve neglected to mention the new house I had built in Black’s absence.

Most likely, Black, like any young fellow who’d set his mind to becoming a

man of wealth and prestige, considered it quite discourteous to broach such a

subject. Still, when we entered, I told him on the staircase that the second

floor was always less humid, and that moving upstairs had served to ease the

pains in my joints. When I said “the second floor,” I felt oddly embarrassed,

but let me tell you: Men with much less money than I, even simple spahi

cavalrymen with tiny military fiefs, will soon be able to build two-story

houses.

We were in the room with the blue door that I used as the painting

workshop in winter, and I sensed that Black was aware of Shekure’s presence

in the adjacent room. I at once disclosed to him the matter that inspired the

letter I’d sent to Tabriz, inviting him to Istanbul.

“Just as you did in concert with the calligraphers and miniaturists of Tabriz,

I, too, have been preparing an illustrated manuscript,” I said. “My client is, in

fact, His Excellency Our Sultan, the Foundation of the World. Because this

book is a secret, Our Sultan has disbursed payment to me under cover of the

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Head Treasurer. And I have come to an understanding with each of the most

talented and accomplished artists of Our Sultan’s atelier. I have been in the

process of commissioning one of them to illustrate a dog, another a tree, a

third I’ve charged with making border designs and clouds on the horizon, and

yet another is responsible for the horses. I wanted the things I depicted to

represent Our Sultan’s entire world, just as in the paintings of the Venetian

masters. But unlike the Venetians, my work would not merely depict material

objects, but naturally the inner riches, the joys and fears of the realm over

which Our Sultan rules. If I ended up including the picture of a gold coin, it

was to belittle money; I included Death and Satan because we fear them. I

don’t know what the rumors are about. I wanted the immortality of a tree,

the weariness of a horse and the vulgarity of a dog to represent His Excellency

Our Sultan and His worldly realm. I also wanted my cadre of illustrators,

nicknamed ”Stork,“ ”Olive,“ ”Elegant‘ and “Butterfly,” to select subjects of

their own choosing. On even the coldest, most forbidding winter evenings,

one of my Sultan’s illustrators would secretly visit to show me what he’d

prepared for the book.

“What kind of pictures were we making? Why were we illustrating them in

that way? I can’t really answer you at present. Not because I’m withholding a

secret from you, and not because I won’t eventually tell you. It’s as though I

myself don’t quite know what the pictures mean. I do, however, know what

kind of paintings they ought to be.”

Four months after I sent my letter, I heard from the barber located on the

street where we used to live that Black had returned to Istanbul, and, in turn, I

invited him to our house. I was fully aware that my story bore a promise of

both sorrow and bliss that would bind the two of us together.

“Every picture serves to tell a story,” I said. “The miniaturist, in order to

beautify the manuscript we read, depicts the most vital scenes: the first time

lovers lay eyes on each other; the hero Rüstem cutting off the head of a

devilish monster; Rüstem’s grief when he realizes that the stranger he’s killed

is his son; the love-crazed Mejnun as he roams a desolate and wild Nature

among lions, tigers, stags and jackals; the anguish of Alexander, who, having

come to the forest before a battle to divine its outcome from the birds,

witnesses a great falcon tear apart his woodcock. Our eyes, fatigued from

reading these tales, rest upon the pictures. If there’s something within the text

that our intellect and imagination are at pains to conjure, the illustration

comes at once to our aid. The images are the story’s blossoming in color. But

painting without its accompanying story is an impossibility.

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“Or so I used to think,” I added, as if regretfully. “But this is indeed quite

possible. Two years ago I traveled once again to Venice as the Sultan’s

ambassador. I observed at length the portraits that the Venetian masters had

made. I did so without knowing to which scene and story the pictures

belonged, and I struggled to extract the story from the image. One day, I came

across a painting hanging on a palazzo wall and was dumbfounded.

“More than anything, the image was of an individual, somebody like

myself. It was an infidel, of course, not one of us. As I stared at him, though, I

felt as if I resembled him. Yet he didn’t resemble me at all. He had a full round

face that seemed to lack cheekbones, and moreover, he had no trace of my

marvelous chin. Though he didn’t look anything like me, as I gazed upon the

picture, for some reason, my heart fluttered as if it were my own portrait.

“I learned from the Venetian gentleman who was giving me a tour through

his palazzo that the portrait was of a friend, a nobleman like himself. He had

included whatever was significant in his life in his portrait: In the background

landscape visible from the open window there was a farm, a village and a

blending of color which made a realistic-looking forest. Resting on the table

before the nobleman were a clock, books, Time, Evil, Life, a calligraphy pen, a

map, a compass, boxes containing gold coins, bric-a-brac, odds and ends,

inscrutable yet distinguishable things that were probably included in many

pictures, shadows of jinns and the Devil and also, the picture of the man’s

stunningly beautiful daughter as she stood beside her father.

“What was the narrative that this representation was meant to embellish

and complete? As I regarded the work, I slowly sensed that the underlying tale

was the picture itself. The painting wasn’t the extension of a story at all, it was

something in its own right.

“I never forgot the painting that bewildered me so. I left the palazzo,

returned to the house where I was staying as a guest and pondered the picture

the entire night. I, too, wanted to be portrayed in this manner. But, no, that

wasn’t appropriate, it was Our Sultan who ought to be thus portrayed! Our

Sultan ought to be rendered along with everything He owned, with the things

that represented and constituted His realm. I settled on the notion that a

manuscript could be illustrated according to this idea.

“The Venetian virtuoso had made the nobleman’s picture in such a way

that you would immediately know which particular nobleman it was. If you’d

never seen that man, if they told you to pick him out of a crowd of a thousand

others, you’d be able to select the correct man with the help of that portrait.

The Venetian masters had discovered painting techniques with which they

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could distinguish any one man from another—without relying on his outfit or

medals, just by the distinctive shape of his face. This was the essence of

”portraiture.“

“If your face were depicted in this fashion only once, no one would ever be

able to forget you, and if you were far away, someone who laid eyes on your

portrait would feel your presence as if you were actually nearby. Those who

had never seen you alive, even years after your death, could come face-to-face

with you as if you were standing before them.”

We remained silent for a long time. A chilling light the color of the iciness

outside filtered through the upper part of the small hallway window facing the

street; this was the window whose lower shutters were never opened, which

I’d recently paned over with a piece of cloth dipped in beeswax.

“There was a miniaturist,” I said. “He would come here just like the other

artists for the sake of Our Sultan’s secret book, and we would work together

till dawn. He did the best of the gilding. That unfortunate Elegant Effendi, he

left here one night never to arrive at home. I’m afraid they might have done

him in, that poor master gilder of mine.”

30

I AM ORHAN

Black asked: “Have they indeed killed him?”

This Black was tall, skinny and a little frightening. I was walking toward

them where they sat talking in the second-floor workshop with the blue door

when my grandfather said, “They might have done him in.” Then he caught

sight of me. “What are you doing here?”

He looked at me in such a way that I climbed onto his lap without

answering. Then he put me back down right away.

“Kiss Black’s hand,” he said.

I kissed the back of his hand and touched it to my forehead. It had no smell.

“He’s quite charming,” Black said and kissed me on my cheek. “One day

he’ll be a brave young man.”

“This is Orhan, he’s six. There’s also an older one, Shevket, who’s seven.

That one’s quite a stubborn little child.”

“I went back to the old street in Aksaray,” said Black. “It was cold,

everything was covered in snow and ice. But it was as if nothing had changed

at all.”

“Alas! Everything has changed, everything has become worse,” my

grandfather said. “Significantly worse.” He turned to me. “Where’s your

brother?”

“He’s with our mentor, the master binder.”

“So, what are you doing here?”

“The master said, ”Fine work, you can go now‘ to me.“

“You made your way back here alone?” asked my grandfather. “Your older

brother ought to have accompanied you.” Then he said to Black: “There’s a

binder friend of mine with whom they work twice a week after their Koran

school. They serve as his apprentices, learning the art of binding.”

“Do you like to make illustrations like your grandfather?” asked Black.

I gave him no answer.

“All right then,” said my grandfather. “Leave us be, now.”

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The heat from the open brazier that warmed the room was so nice that I

didn’t want to leave. Smelling the paint and glue, I stood still for a moment. I

could also smell coffee.

“Yet does illustrating in a new way signify a new way of seeing?” my

grandfather began. “This is the reason why they’ve murdered that poor gilder

despite the fact that he worked in the old style. I’m not even certain he’s been

killed, only that he’s missing. They’re illustrating a commemorative story in

verse, a Book of Festivities, for Our Sultan by order of the Head Illuminator

Master Osman. Each of the miniaturists works at his own home. Master

Osman, however, occupies himself at the palace book-arts workshop. To begin