Living and Remembering the World War

In Living and Remembering the World War, Mehmet Beşikçi examines the experience of the First World War through autobiographical sources belonging to soldiers. Determining that there is an organic relationship between the experience of the World War and the way soldiers remember this experience and the problematic official and collective memory of the First World War in Turkey, the book offers a perspective that blends the fields of military history and memory studies to analyze this relationship. Memorable memories of the Caucasus, Çanakkale, Iraq and Sinai-Palestine fronts; The diversity of the war experiences of Ottoman soldiers, with their different religions and identities, reflected in the memories; Comparison of Ottoman and British soldiers' ways of remembering the war; The daily life of the fronts, the unique difficulties of trench warfare, and sometimes the state of an army in retreat in the memory records are pure... Beşikçi explains not only how memories should be examined, but also how military history is a tremendous resource in understanding the collective memory of the Turkish society about recent history. It offers a competent example of how it can be handled.

“This book wants to trace the unfinished stories of the Ottoman soldiers who participated in the First World War, and aims to do this through their own remembered and recorded memories. It aims to shed light on the human dimension and memory of the World War, so to speak, by trying to understand the front-line experiences of those who personally waged the war and how they remembered these experiences.”

-Mehmet Beşikçi

(From the Promotional Bulletin)

Dough Type: 2nd Dough

Size: 13 x 19.5

First Print Year: 2019

Number of Printings: 1st Edition

Language Turkish