Part historical detective story, part biography, "The Turk" relates the saga of an unusual 18th-century robot--fashioned from wood to look like a man who was dressed like a Turk and played chess. 25 illustrations.

"This work contains a detailed discussion of the sizeable body of literature surrounding the Turk along with an extensive analysis of its hidden operation. A collection of published games played by the Turk, many, again, unknown for 200 years, is also included, along with numerous other games known to have been played elsewhere by the Turk's hidden directors."--BOOK JACKET.

This title tells the true story of the Turk, the infamous 18th-century automation. The story links an unlikely cast of historical characters, from Napoleon, Beethoven and Poe to the pioneers of the computer age, and provides an accessible way of examining the complex relationship between magic, man, mind and machine, from the Enlightenment to the computer age.

In "Is the Turk a White Man?" Murat Ergin examines how the links between race and modernity has shaped the formation of Turkish identity.

Eighty years have passed since Mustafa Kemal Ataturk founded the Turkish Republic out of the ruins of the Ottoman Empire and set it on the path of modernisation. He was determined that his country should be accepted as a member of the family of civilised nations. Today Turkey is a rapidly developing country, an emergent market and a medium-sized regional power with the second strongest army in NATO. It is an open country which attracts millions of tourists, thousands of foreign businessmen and hundreds of researchers. They enjoy Turkish hospitality and experience its rich landscape and history, but many find it hard to form an overall picture of the country. In this sequel to his acclaimed biography of Ataturk, Andrew Mango provides such an overall portrait, tracing the republic's development since the death of its founder and bringing to life the Turkish people and their vibrant society. The Turks Today interprets the latest academic research for a broader audience, making this highly readable book the authoritative work on modern Turkey.

While writing his celebrated Frugal Traveler column for the New York Times, Matt Gross began to feel hemmed in by its focus on what he thought of as “traveling on the cheap at all costs.” When his editor offered him the opportunity to do something less structured, the Getting Lost series was born, and Gross began a more immersive form of travel that allowed him to “lose his way all over the globe”--from developing-world megalopolises to venerable European capitals, from American sprawl to Asian archipelagos. And that’s what the never-before-published material in The Turk Who Loved Apples is all about: breaking free of the constraints of modern travel and letting the place itself guide you. It’s a variety of travel you’ll love to experience vicariously through Matt Gross--and maybe even be inspired to try for yourself.

Traces the Turkic peoples' trajectory from steppe, to empire, to nation-state. Unifying cultural, economic, social, and political history, this work illuminates the projection of Turkic identity across space and time and the profound transformations marked successively by the Turks' entry into Islam and into modernity.