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Rhea Galanaki: Ο βίος του Ισμαήλ Φερίκ Πασά (The Life of Ismail Ferik Pasha)
Ismail Ferik Pasha was very much a real person but, as Rhea Galanaki points out in her foreword, while we know something about him from the historical record, particularly his campaign in Crete, much of what we think we know about his early life, is lost in myths. She tries to separate the two in this work and, when it comes to the myth part, feels emboldened to elaborate.However, even in the history part we see his story from his point of view, told in the first person, so that what happened may be historically accurate while his views on what is happening is certainly Galanaki’s invention.
Briefly, we know that Ferik Pasha and his brother Antonios were born in Crete and as children, seized by the Ottomans when they were suppressing a rebellion in Crete which they occupied. The two boys were sent into slavery, Ismail to Egypt and Antonios to Constantinople. They end up on opposite sides, Ismail head of the Ottoman army suppressing a later rebellion in Crete and Antonios, who had escaped, aiding the Cretans.
The novel opens with the two boys and their mother hiding from the Ottomans in a cave with their mother. The men are fighting and lose. Those hiding in the cave are captured. The two boys are shackled together,, What happens to the mother is unclear though there are various stories about her possible fate. Ismail is taken to Cairo and Antonios to Constantinople.
It was often the custom for promising looking slave and other young boys to be pulled out and sent off for military training. This is what happened to Mohammed Ali, then leader of Egypt who had been recognised when he came with a troop from his home town in the Macedonian part of Greece (his family was ethnically Albanian).
Ismail was recognised as promising, apparently by Mohammed Ali himself and we learn how he adapts to being Egyptian. He is circumcised and becomes a Muslim. The one memory he still hangs onto is his mother’s last embrace.
Now, like his fellow Egyptians, he becomes involved in things Egyptian such as the the huge role of the Nile in Egyptian life. He speaks Arabic but talks to himself in Greek to keep his native tongue alive.
When key events happen such as the Battle of Navarino and the Egyptians are devastated,they do not connect him with their enemy.
Ibrahim, Mohammed Ali’s favourite son and heir apparent is now assuming more importance. The Sultan has given Crete to Egypt but they want Syria with its forests. They need the wood to rebuild the fleet after losing so many ships at Navarino. Ismail now joins Ibrahim in the army in the wars in Syria and the pair soon become close. Indeed they attack the Sultan in Turkey. There are many battles and many victories and defeats. When Ibrahim withdraws from fighting he soon becomes depressed and he and Ismail travel round Europe, visiting monasteries, libraries and art galleries as well of course as looking at the technology in various areas. They had assumed Europe was stable but it is not, with unrest in various countries . They even go to Constantinople where Ibrahim is crowned Viceroy of Egypt.
Back in Cairo, Ismail gets a visitor from Greece, a Greek man called. Ioannis Papadakis. It turns out that he is Ismail’s cousin and has been sent by Antonios, Ismail’s brother. We learn how Antonios escaped and how he has become very rich but also part of a secret society supporting Greek independence. Ioannis stays with Ismail for a long while and tries to find Ismail’s real feelings but does not succeed. The two brothers start a furtive correspondence. Ismail considers giving up his post and joining his brother but knows that he cannot.
We move on to what Galanaki calls the History part as the Egyptians aid the Sultan in repressing a revolt in Ceete. Though now Minister of War, Ismail leads the army. We follow the events in detail – Ismail is wounded but not seriously – and there is a lot of action and dispute between Ismail and the Sultan’s commander, also a renegade, a former Austrian army officer now called Omer Pasha, who is ruthless and cruel.
The campaign is difficult because the Egyptians are not used to mountain fighting, they are hit by typhus and lose quite a few battles. Omer Pasha becomes more ruthless.
Ismail sees the place where he used to live and, indeed, the area where he was captured. However what makes this book is the fairly long section describing this campaign, some about the actual events but a lot about what is going through his mind about his life, his parents and brother and his inner conflict between his Cretan side and his Egyptian side. I told myself that for many centuries the conquerors and the conquered had been setting the scene for the last act of my life in a manner reminiscent of the operatic stage sets I had seen in Europe long ago.
Galanaki tells a superb story as she gets right into the mind of Ismail, his inner conflict, his sense of responsibility and his loyalty to both sides. He was. a soldier and, as a result was the responsible for many deaths and many of those deaths were of people simply defending their country. Yet she shows him as an honourable man who tries to abide by the rules of war, in marked distinction to Omer Pasha who is cruel and ruthless. Fate placed Ismail in Egypt and he tried to be a good Egyptian while always remaining a Cretan, not an easy task. Galanaki shows how he almost succeeds.
Publishing history
First published in 1989 by Agra
First English translation in 1996 by Peter Owen
Translated by Kay Cicellis