It was quite a sensation in 2006 when Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk won the Nobel Prize for Literature.  Three years ago Slate published a story about how the celebrated author narrowly escaped prison:

The trouble began last February, when Pamuk told the Swiss news magazine Das Magazin that “one million Armenians and 30,000 Kurds were killed in these lands and no one but me dares talk about it.” For this statement, Pamuk received death threats from Turkish nationalists and was eventually charged under a new Turkish law with “insulting” the Turkish Republic. When he went on trial in December, he faced up to three years in prison.

In Turkey, you risk imprisonment if you discuss the Armenian Genocide.  It’s an entire country in forced denial.

Yet Pamuk, the country’s best-selling novelist, spoke out.   Ever since he is not only the face of Turkish literature to the west, but also the face of Turkish liberalism.

Pamuk was at Barnes & Noble Union Square to discuss his new book about love, The Innocence Museum.  He was practically giddy on stage in proclaiming the theme, although he was quick to point out that he does not put the emotion upon a pedestal.

He said he was interested in how love is like a car accident that hits us all.   From Karen Long’s well-written review in the Plain Dealer:

Our guide into “The Museum of Innocence” is a liar, a drunk, a kleptomaniac and a spoiled Istanbul society boy named Kemal Basmaci.  [....]

Pamuk begins “The Museum of Innocence” with what Kemal declares as “the happiest moment of my life, though I didn’t know it.”

Who among us does? Kemal’s moment is with a woman. In the opening paragraph, her earring drops unheeded to the sheets during their lovemaking in one of his family’s spare Istanbul apartments. The earring becomes the first exhibit in the museum.

In taking questions, Pamuk would not discuss the political tensions surrounding him back in Turkey, perhaps because last May it was reported that he may face re-trial.  No doubt he does not want to add to any problems, particularly as his book is not political, although 1975 Istanbul through today is a central character in the novel.  Buy the book.

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Somebody has to clean it...

The folks in Ludington, Michigan like to turn lemons into lemonade.  According to local ABC television affiliate WZZM, over a year ago the SS Badger, the Lake Michigan car ferry that shuttles between Ludington and Manitowoc, Wisconsin, wanted the Discovery Channel‘s “Dirty Jobs” program to spotlight this floating historic site.  But the producers said they would only come to Ludington if there was more than one dirty job.  Now Ludington is tap-dancing in front of the Dirty Jobs producers again, hoping to score some national exposure with local businesses involved in “removing skunks, packing meat, getting rid of sea lamprey, cleaning heat ducts or making pesticides .

Ludington may want to be careful what it wishes for, because it just might get a flood of immigrants desperate for any job that skunk removal might not be so bad.  According to NPR, the unemployment in the country has made dirty jobs (the ones that used to be described as ones only immigrants would do) are back en vogue.

That was NPR’s point, focusing on the Cascade Humane Society in Jackson, also in Michigan.  According to the non-profit’s executive director, Debra Carmody, they have been inundated with over-qualified people for a few recent jobs:

Jobs are scarce in Michigan and the state’s unemployment rate of 10.6 percent is the highest in the nation.

“They almost all had college degrees, many of them had master’s degrees,” Carmody says of those applying for jobs at her animal shelter. “There were two or three former executive directors of nonprofits.

“The one that really blew me away was we had one attorney.”

Go here to listen to the full story about the return of dirty work.

A sign of the times is the stories about people dumbing-down their resumes to get lower jobs.  Adweek warns that people who might be willing to a take a huge pay cut and a lower status “may not get the job because they’re overqualified“. As if picking up that bugle, McClatchy Newspapers sent out local reporters in its empire to write these stories.  The Cleveland Plain-Dealer ran McClatchy story that told us, “Adapting to lean times, résumés also get leaner”.  The Akron Beacon Journal ran a McClatchy story “Job seekers tone down resumes – Professionals leave out titles, degrees so they don’t seem overqualified”.   The Dallas Morning News re-ran McClatchy’s Charlotte Observer story, “Interview Seekers Omit Details on Resumes”.  The Seattle Times ran a McClatchy story that intoned “Overqualified applicants flooding the job market”.

What’s all this mean?  Probably that people are dumbing down resumes, but only one news company is the main source behind all the headlines.