MY LIFE AND THOUGHTS

No big surprises from the Turkish parliamentary elections yesterday, but I did want to share my favorite item of pre-election news: a speech in which the leader of the far-right nationalist party mispronounced bisküvi (biscuit) as püskevit. I’ve been trying to think of how to translate püskevit to convey the right effect.  Piscuit?  Bisguit?  Bisguat? In the speech he is saying something like, “Children watch TV commercials, they see smiling children eating chocolate and piscuit, and they think: ‘if only I had chocolate – if only I had piscuit!  Mother, get me chocolate!  Get me piscuit!’”

Within days/ hours, there was a puskevit.com site online (it shows a screenshot of the entry for “biscuit” in the Turkish Language Institute dictionary) and a number of “püskevit remixes” (my favorite here).

The nationalists subsequently announced that “püskevit” was a regional (Adana/ Osmaniye) pronunciation, and that a popular snack food (“Anatolian fast-food”) back in the day was a sandwich made with two biscuits and a piece of Turkish delight (lokum).  It’s not totally clear to me whether the idea is that “püskevit” was the Adana word for the biscuit-lokum sandwich, or, as seems more likely, just the word for biscuits in general; in any case, this sandwich, under the name “püskevit,” rapidly became a standard snack at nationalist rallies. Püskevit pride was also (re)awakened in Adana where, according to a local locum maker, this noble snack was once served at weddings and on Mohammed’s birthday:

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A response to a comment from Chad (to my post about not reading reviews):

How do critical responses to your articles come into play? I’m mostly just curious about whether or not you’ve read Mark McGurl’s response to “Get a Real Degree” in the LA Review of Books.

Dear Chad!  You’re right – it’s a very similar situation. On the one hand, it seems solipsistic to be sitting at a desk writing things and ignoring the responses… especially when what you’re writing is criticism… and especially when that criticism is couched as some kind of polemical gauntlet, e.g. by means of a title like “Get a Real Degree” (which I did not come up with myself).¹

On the other hand… these dialogues invariably involve such a time-lag! Someone writes a book; you take the time to read it and articulate what you think the deal is; the writer takes the time to read your opinion and articulate what he thinks the deal is, and by then years have passed. (I wrote the LRB piece in 2009, six months before it was published.) It’s a real investment to get back into the state of mind you were in before. You lose time and tranquility.

Is it selfish of me to value my time and tranquility over the exigencies of public debate regarding American creative writing programs? I don’t know. (For real, I don’t know.) All I can say is that right now I’m getting started on a new project, totally unrelated to creative writing programs, and full of totally new challenges, and it needs all my energy.  There’s just one of me, and, if I don’t keep the momentum going, who is going to do it for me?  (Pushkin?  My intern?)  For the time being, that means no adrenalinizing detours down memory lane. Although there is no doubt in my mind that McGurl’s response is super-smart and thought-provoking (as was his book), and although I fully intend to read and think about it when my own work permits, now is not that time.

As always, a big thanks to everyone who doesn’t think that whatever I just said makes me some kind of jerk. (Am thinking of appending this disclaimer to everything I write.)

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Fans of Kafka and kittens may (must?) enjoy the following:

My intern was particularly impressed by the artistic use made of the hairball: clearly something “in the air” at the current historical moment.  See, for example, the recent excellent article in Modern Cat on how to Celebrate National Hairball Awareness Day in Style:

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Thanks for the great responses to the prev post, which I reproduce here:

1. From mikeym:

patriots love, not packers
*bless*

2. From SW Foska:

Particularly intrigued by the idea of a set of 3 crutches. But presumably, as one who takes koalas, fellating hedgehogs and anatomically impossible cows in your unimpeded quotidian stride, you’re less fazed by this than me.

3. From Libbie+:

You were right the 1st time — it’s those Cheeseheads, the Packers, but more importantly the Steelers. Can one buy a Terrible Towel through Amazon? That would be a great way to aid the dental health of your intern. Any thoughts on Egypt? Or Egyptian literature? And I am starting a grassroots NM movement to get you to visit and speak in The Land of Enchantment… L in ABQ

In response:

1. Huge thanks/ much respek to both mikeym for the correction, and Libbie+ for the nuanced contextualization!

2. Dear SW Foska – I know, I know. Here is a riddle for you: what uses one tiny crutch in the lateish morning, a medium-sized crutch around noon, and a larger crutch after that? I’m not sure what the answer is, but I think it is probably very sad and possibly congenital.

(Another interpretation, emailed by an anonymous reader: “I like how they have them sized for the whole family, like for the three little bears (post drunk-driving accident).”)
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A quick response to this fascinating item of trivia re: Tolstoy and the RNC (thank you, Chad!):

…This really has nothing to do with Turkish women/tea glasses, but I was wondering if you had heard about Michael Steele’s response when asked what is his favorite book at the RNC chair debate. He said “War and Peace” but then added, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”

Somehow everything I ever hear about Michael Steele brings back to me the pathos of the human condition, I guess largely through Jon Stewart’s image of him as the Muppet who always has a fly in his soup – actually a kind of Tolstoy-like detail, when you think about it.

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times!”

[Note to self: could the entire dissatisfied-Muppet/ Grover relationship be based on the tense interchange between Oblonsky and the Tatar waiter (AK I, 10)?]

Mostly though I feel like this is a valuable object lesson to all of us in not trying to spontaneously produce the first sentence of WP on national television, because let’s be honest,  it’s a great book and everything, but Tolstoy didn’t exactly bust out his catchiest lines on the opening:

“Eh bien, mon prince, Gênes et Lucques ne sont plus que des apanages, des country estates, de la famille Buonaparte.”

Or, for those who prefer the original Russian:

“Eh bien, mon prince. Gênes et Lucques ne sont plus que des apanages, des поместья, de la famille Buonaparte.”