A literary discovery: an uproarious tragicomedy of modernization, in its first-ever English translation   Perhaps the greatest Turkish novel of the twentieth century, being discovered around the world only now, more than fifty years after its first publication, The Time Regulation Institute is an antic, freewheeling send-up of the modern bureaucratic state.   At its center is Hayri Irdal, an infectiously charming antihero who becomes entangled with an eccentric cast of characters—a television mystic, a pharmacist who dabbles in alchemy, a dignitary from the lost Ottoman Empire, a “clock whisperer”—at the Time Regulation Institute, a vast organization that employs a hilariously intricate system of fines for the purpose of changing all the clocks in Turkey to Western time. Recounted in sessions with his psychoanalyst, the story of Hayri Irdal’s absurdist misadventures plays out as a brilliant allegory of the collision of tradition and modernity, of East and West, infused with a poignant blend of hope for the promise of the future and nostalgia for a simpler time. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

Time Regulation Institute

Literature & Fiction

Ahmet Hamdi Tanpinar

Contemporary

Penguin Books, Ltd.

Set on the eve of World War II, A Mind at Peace captures the anxieties of a Turkish family facing the difficult reality entrenched in the early republic, founded on the ashes of the Ottoman Empire in 1923. Poetically drawing on the effects of cultural upheaval on the individual, Ahmet Hamdi Tanpinar illuminates the precarious balance between tradition and modernity, East and West. Ahmet Hamdi Tanpinar has been noted as the most prominant Turkish novelist of the twentieth century. Born in Istanbul, he traveled widely in Anatolia before returning to Istanbul in 1919, after the First World War, to study literature with the poet laureate Yahya Kemal. Deeply influenced by Paul Valéry and Bergson, Tanpinar created a cultural universe in his work, bringing together Western forms of writing and the sensibilities of a decadent Ottoman culture. He taught aesthetics, mythology, and literature at the University of Istanbul. Erdag Göknar is assistant professor of Turkish Studies at Duke University. He holds an MFA in creative writing and a Ph.D. in Near and Middle East Studies. He received, with Orhan Pamuk, the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award for his English translation of Pamuk’s My Name is Red in 2003. He is also the recipient a Fulbright fellowship and an NEA translation grant for A Mind at Peace.

A Mind at Peace

Literary

Archipelago Books

"The greatest novel ever written about Istanbul." —Orhan Pamuk A Mind at Peace, originally published in 1949, is a Turkish Ulysses and a poetic homage to Istanbul. A historical novel of ideas as well as a love story set in the "city of two continents," a Turkish parliamentary leader chose Tanpinar's chef d'ouevre to present to President Obama so that he "might better understand the Turkish people. . . and in it find the nuances of our culture and our identity." Mümtaz has survived the childhood trauma of his parents' untimely deaths in the early skirmishes of World War I as well as the tumultuous cultural revolutions following the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the rise of the early Turkish Republic. He takes refuge in the fading past, immersing himself in literature and music, even as he faces an uncertain future with his beloved, Nuran. Can their love save them both from the turbulent times, or will inner obsessions, along with powerful social and political forces, tear the couple apart?

United States

Das Uhrenstellinstitut

Hanser, Carl GmbH + Co.

Huzur

Yapı Kredi Yayınları

Mahur Beste

Mucevherlerin Sirri

Sahnenin Disindakiler

Dergah Yayınları

Hüsrev ü Sirin

مؤسسة ضبط الساعة

طانبنار، أحمد حمدي

عبد اللي، عبد القادر

الدار العربية للعلوم ناشرون

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Books by Ahmet Hamdi Tanpinar