Surgical Ward 9

Istanbul, 1915. While the Ottoman Empire is in the thick of war and fighting for its life, an unnamed fifteen-year-old boy has his own pressing concerns: he suffers from severe bone tuberculosis and drifts from doctor to doctor, unwilling to follow their advice. As his incurable condition and resulting despair trap him in fevered, psychological seclusion, he seeks solace in his infatuation with an older girl, Nüzhet. Surgical Ward 9 is a raw and honest account of a sick person’s inner world—his envy, longing, ambition, disappointment, terror, hope, and despair. This melancholic yet strangely vibrant book bears traces of Peyami Safa’s own childhood, and its power still endures today.