Public Lecture: Saving Lives, Collapsing Civilizations: Arnold Toynbee in the Turkish War of Independence

David S. Katz, Abraham Horodisch Chair for the History of Books at Tel Aviv University and 2014-15 Visiting Fellow at Princeton University.

Thursday, October 9, 5:30 p.m. - The Joseph C. Bancroft Conference Room (Croft 107)

The defeat of the Ottoman Empire, and the occupation of Istanbul by the Allies in December 1918, was an opportunity to redraw the map of Europe. With the approval of the Allies, Greek forces landed at Smryna on 15 May 1919 and proceeded to gobble up large segments of Anatolia. This was a big ‘story’, and every newspaper baron knew it. Then as now, there was nothing like having a man on the spot. The Manchester Guardian sent out Arnold J. Toynbee (1889-1975). The thirty-two-year-old Englishman arrived in Smyrna on 27 January 1921, and after eight months left for home from Istanbul (16 September 1921). Toynbee filed eyewitness reports that were crucial in improving Turkey's image in Britain, while at the same time having the opportunity to save the lives of hundreds of Turkish civilians through his fearless personal intervention on the docks at Yalova and İzmit. Toynbee's assignment to Turkey would also change his professional life. For it was on his way home, traveling the Orient Express on 17 September 1921, that he had the idea of how to organize the books that would become his famous A Study of History, the dozen volumes published between 1934 and 1961 that would make him a household name throughout the English-speaking world and put him on the cover of Time magazine, crowned by the popular press as the greatest historian of his day.