Siege

“Kadare does not count The Siege as a historical novel” is not the sort of thing you want to read in the afterword for the book you’ve just finished as part of this month’s Love Blippin’ Books #LBB8 challenge of “It’s all in the past!”  However, I will (appositely) stick to my guns and assert that a novel about a fifteenth century siege of an Albanian fortified town (based on the Siege of Krujë - 1450) by a nascent and expansive Ottoman Empire is suitably historical.

This had been another random charity shop purchase some months ago, probably prompted by my reading of Patrick Leigh Fermor’s books about his 1930s walk from London to Constantinople over the past year or so. I didn’t know anything about Kadare and hadn’t read any of his other books. 

I’m guessing his remark about The Siege not being historical relates to the fact that any novel written and published in  Albania in 1970 had to disguise its commentary on the country at that time. However, it is a very accessible read full of awful details about siege warfare in particular and it’s not difficult to see relevance in the world around us for example with the Siege of Aleppo. And I think it can only be helpful to me to learn more about the historical context for conflict between Islam and Christianity.  I will probably pick up more of Kadere’s books if I see them.

The historical bonus book is my 1897 Public Schools Atlas of Modern Geography, from which the Turkey in Europe page shows, at that time, five centuries of the Ottomon Empire was still very current.

Thanks to @lizzie_birkett for hosting this month’s challenge and to @squatbetty for convening LBB. Watch this space for the September prompt.