Dinner of Herbs - Carla Grissmann
Dinner of Herbs - Carla Grissmann
Carla Grissmann, an American whose cosmopolitan life had already seen her living in Morocco, Paris and Jerusalem, spent the better part of a year in the ’60s living in a farming hamlet in remote Anatolia, some 250 kilometres east of Ankara. The hospitality, the friendship and the way in which the inhabitants of Uzak Köy accepted her into their community left a deep impression, and were remembered and treasured in a private memoir. Not for some forty years was it published, and yet it is one of the most honest, clear-sighted and affectionate portraits of rural Turkey, testimony to Proverbs 15:17, ‘Better is a dinner of herbs where love is, than feasting on a fattened ox where hatred also dwells’.
‘Extremely moving. Grissmann captures life in remote Anatolia with stark honesty and compassion.’ Paul Bowles
‘More than anything I have read, it captures the hum of everyday life in an Anatolian village, the almost tangible good cheer that rises out of that community.’ Maureen Freely, Cornucopia
Dinner of Herbs
ISBN: 978-1-78060-043-7
Format: 192pp demi pb
Place: Turkey, Anatolia
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
An American by birth, Carla Grissmann spent most of her life outside the US. She was a 41 when she took a break in rural Turkey from an otherwise cosmopolitan life. She spent many years living between London and Afghanistan where she worked at the National Museum of Kabul and she became critical to the museum’s survival. She will be remembered as a great defender of Afghanistan’s cultural heritage.