Many colleagues and friends have generously encouraged and assisted me over the long years that Osman’s Dream has been in the making. They have answered a multitude of queries in person and by mail; sent me articles and books both unpublished and published; read single chapters, multiple chapters, even the complete typescript; and at every turn attempted to save me from error. Without the willingness of all these people to share the fruits of their scholarship so unreservedly, I could not have embarked upon writing this book.
My greatest debt of gratitude is reserved for the staff of the Istanbul branch of the American Research Institute in Turkey: the director Antony Greenwood and his assistants Gülden Güneri and Semrin Korkmaz tolerated my presence for months at a time, as I read my way through the Institute’s excellent collection of material relating to matters Ottoman – and every day for months shared lunch with me. Without the delight of my morning boat-ride across the Bosporus, and the calm of the Institute’s library, I would have given up at an early stage. I began writing Osman’s Dream in Cambridge, where Kate Fleet of the Skilliter Centre at Cambridge University gave me the run of the Skilliter Library, another oasis for the Ottomanist, and I am also appreciative of the help of the staff of the Institut français des études anatoliennes and the İslam Araştırmaları Vakfi library, both in Istanbul, and of the British Library, for permitting me the use of their rich collections.
Of the many others whose myriad assistances are discernible in my book, I mention the following by name: Gábor Ágoston, Virginia Aksan, John Alexander, Jean-Louis Bacqué-Grammont, Marc Baer, Michele Bernardini, İdris Bostan, Gregory Bruess, Duncan Bull, Robert Dankoff, Caroline Davidson, Selim Deringil, Kathryn M. Ebel, Howard Eissenstadt, Y. Hakan Erdem, Selçuk Esenbel, Suraiya Faroqhi, Cornell Fleischer, Pál Fodor, John Freely, Fatma Müge Göçek, Daniel Goffman, Yasemin Gönen, Rossitsa Gradeva, Jane Hathaway, Colin Heywood, Frédéric Hitzel, M. Şükrü Hanioğlu, Colin Imber, Robert Jones, Yavuz Selim Karakışla, Claire Ruoff Karaz, Michael Khodarkovsky, Machiel Kiel, Dariusz Kolodziejczyk, Klaus Kreiser, Donna Landry, Heath Lowry, Gerald MacLean, Andrew Mango, Nenad Moačanin, Rhoads Murphey, Oktay Özel, Burcu Özgüven, Oded Peri, Hedda Reindl-Kiel, Kahraman Şakul, Ariel Salzmann, Hamish Scott, Norman Stone, Frank Sysyn, Nabil al-Tikriti, Christine Thompson, Lucienne Thys-Şenocak, Gündüz Vassaf, Sara Nur Yıldız, Fehmi Yılmaz, Elizabeth Zachariadou, Fariba Zarinebaf-Shahr. This list cannot hope to be exhaustive, and there are many others whose help I benefited from along the way. Two more to whom I am indebted are Joyce Matthews, who translated many of the passages of prose and poetry from Ottoman Turkish into mellifluous English, striving with singular success to catch the tone of the original; and Ara Güler, who photographed me for the publicity material.
Writing is hard; coming by illustrations is harder. I would like to thank the following, in particular, for making the process relatively painless: Filiz Çağman, Zeynep Çelik and Gülendam Nakipoğlu of Topkapı Palace Library; Edhem Eldem; Muhittin Eren of Eren Publications, Istanbul; John Scott of Cornucopia Magazine; F. Muhtar Katırcıoğlu; the staff of the Cultural Department of Yapı Kredi Bank, Istanbul; Giulia Bartrum of the British Museum, Dept. of Prints and Drawings; Natalia Królikowska; Krzysztof Wawrzyniak.
My commissioning editor at John Murray, Caroline Knox, provided support until the later stages of the book’s passage towards publication: to her, to her successor Gordon Wise, to Caroline Westmore for her exemplary attentiveness to detail, to Cathy Benwell and Nikki Barrow, my warmest thanks are due. Preparing the book for publication in the United States was expedited by the boundless enthusiasm and energy of Lara Heimert, Executive Editor, and David Shoemaker, Assistant Editor. I would also like to acknowledge gratefully the editing skills of Liz Robinson and Elizabeth Dobson who gave the text a fluency it could not otherwise have had. Philip Mansel proposed this book to John Murray, and deserves special mention for being instrumental in initiating the writing of the Ottoman story for a general audience, an opportunity the like of which all too rarely comes the way of an academic historian. My agent Anne Engel gently urged me on when I became discouraged. The maps were drawn by Martin Collins and the index compiled by Douglas Matthews.
I set out on the Ottoman path under the expert and painstaking guidance of Victor Ménage, formerly professor of Turkish at the School of Oriental and African Studies, London University. Now, many years later, I can offer something in return for his wisdom. Another Victor, Victor Ostapchuk, with whom I share a passion for the Ottoman Black Sea and the intricacies of its defence against powers coming from the north, devoted much time to reading my typescript as it progressed and commenting on it in learned depth and detail – despite pressing matters relating to his own work and career. But most of all, I am lucky to have married a writer and journalist – or rather, an academic manqué who became a journalist – who has taught me the indisputable value of making the inaccessible accessible, and that there is usually a form of words that will convey even the most abstruse point to a general audience. To the two Victors – Vic-i büzürg and Vic-i sagir – to Andrew Finkel, and to our daughter Izzy, whose formative years have been spent entirely in the shadow of the Ottomans, I dedicate this book.