Secrets of the Harem

by Carla Coco

NEVER READ-SITTING ON MY BOOKSHELF FOR YEARS. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0865659966
• ISBN13: 9780865659964
• Release Date: January 1997
• Publisher: Rizzoli International Publications
• Length: 191 Pages
• Weight: 3.33 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 9.8" x 12.2"

Customer Reviews

Lavish book, get it while you can

This is a must have for students of Turkish culture and Turkophiles alike. You won't reget buying! I first saw it in Istanbul airport and tried to convince my husband to pay the fifty dollars they were asking. Glad I waited to grab it here it was a lot less, but it would still have been worth the money!

Limited range, but attractive, entertaining, and instructive

In spite of its rather general title, this book is focussed on the harems of the Sultans of Turkey. The author has written guidebooks to Turkey and Istanbul, and she evidently knows her subject thoroughly. The book covers, in great detail, the physical quarters of the harem (the Topkapi seraglio) and its various inhabitants. The author touches upon various subjects -- art, music, and dance; the social hierarchy among the harem eunuchs; the use of drugs and tobacco; and the changing position of women in Turkish culture. (Interestingly, a woman who survived a stint in the harem -- which wasn't necessarily a "given" in some eras! -- was considered a desirable wife rather than "damaged goods." In fact, since a woman qualified for the harem solely because of her personal merits, this was often a path for upward mobility for an attractive, talented young woman of humble origin.) I appreciated the author's careful distinctions between genuine, fact-based depictions of the harem in art and literature, vs. those in which the harem is merely a springboard for some Westerner's fantasy. (However, all those paintings of blond or fair-skinned women in the harem aren't, as some critics assume, inauthentic: slaves were acquired from Greece and Central Asia as well as Africa and Turkey. In fact, more than one Sultan took a Western European wife.) Art and photographs are used extensively: the quality of the reproductions is excellent, the modern photographs are well chosen, and the captions are generally informative. In spite of its dimensions and picture-book appearance, this isn't just a coffee-table book: I found it interesting to read and educational.