Irfan Orga
Irfan Orga was a Turkish fighter pilot, staff officer, and author. He published books on many areas of Turkish life, cookery, and history, as well as a biography of Atatürk, and his own autobiography (Portrait of a Turkish Family). He also wrote two children’s books. Orga was born into a wealthy Ottoman Turkish family in Istanbul. Soon World War I broke and his life was changed forever. Orga witnessed the atrocities and hardships of war. His novels display the common everyday life of an Ottoman Turkish family. It was during his adulthood in 1942, when he met a young married Norman-Irish woman, Margaret Veronyca, while he was on a three-year posting in England from the Turkish air force. However, the Turkish Air Force did not approve of his living with a foreign woman in England, and Orga was stripped of his rank and forced out of the air force. After Veronyca’s divorce had been finalised in 1948, they married. While his wife began working her way up the hierarchy of publishing, Orga pursued several menial jobs. He also began writing and publishing books.
“My head was dizzy, but what of that? Float, stupid wooden head, and care nothing for tomorrow.”
“A whole new life at fifty, all because I had become entranced with both the Turkish culture and with Kazim—who one friend called a careening festival of a human being and another called an alcoholic Kurdish carpet salesman. I called him a catalyst.”