How a Turkish girl broke the heart of a shah
In her latest book, Turkish novelist Nazli Eray shares the story of her mother, a woman whose beauty once stunned Middle East elites and left the Iranian shah heartbroken.
The mother of renowned Turkish novelist Nazli Eray was the only daughter of Turkey’s ambassador to Baghdad in the 1930s, a 17-year-old of proverbial beauty.
In her book “Bir Ruya Gibi Hatirliyorum Seni” (I Remember You as a Dream), Eray describes her mother as a “girl as beautiful as a drop of water.”
Her picture is on the cover. It's a visage that Iranian Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi fell for the moment he saw it, and one that an Iraqi photo studio, Photo Arshaq, displayed in its window for almost six decades until US airstrikes on Baghdad and the ensuing chaos destroyed the shop.
Turkey’s ambassador to Baghdad in the 1930s, Tahir Lutfi, would take his daughter Sermin with him to receptions. Sometimes she would appear at cocktail parties hosted by the Turkish Embassy. Her beauty was the talk of the town. As she took part in Baghdad's social life, often out playing tennis, her popularity grew.
