Continuing our month-long season to celebrate the English PEN centenary, World Book Club talks to multi-award-winning Turkish-Kurdish writer and activist Burhan Sönmez about his unforgettable novel Istanbul, Istanbul.

At once powerfully political and intensely personal, Istanbul, Istanbul is the story of four prisoners kept in underground cells beneath the city, who tell one another stories about their city to pass the time. There are two Istanbuls, one below ground and one above, yet in reality both are one and the same.

Sonmez worked as a lawyer in Istanbul and was a member of IHD, the Human Rights Society, and a founder of BirGün, a daily opposition newspaper. He was seriously injured following an assault by police in 1996 in Turkey and received treatment in Britain afterwards.

Here he discusses his novel, censorship and the tense political situation in Turkey, and the invaluable impact of English PEN and other such pressure groups with presenter Ritula Shah and readers from around the globe.

Istanbul, Istanbul was translated by Ümit Hussein.

(Picture: Burhan Sönmez. Photo credit: Roberto Gandola.)

November 28, 2025

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