Gülhane Park
Park below Topkapı Palace running down to a view of the Bosphorus, Istanbul, Turkey.
At a glance
| Source | Author | Role | In one line |
|---|---|---|---|
| Neither Here Nor There | Bill Bryson | turning point | Where the book ends: a Coke at a taverna, a view of Asia, and the decision to go home. |
Neither Here Nor There — Bill Bryson (1991)
Source: Readwise highlight
found myself presently at the entrance to a large and miraculously tranquil park called Gilhane, full of leafy shade, twittering birds, and happily ambling families.
- Role: turning point
- In the book: The final pages. The park’s central avenue ends “in a sudden and arresting view of the Bosphorus”. At an open-air taverna he orders a Coke and looks across to the white houses of Üsküdar and the ferries. “I had come to the end of my own road. That was Asia over there; this was as far as I could go in Europe.” He is tempted to cross to Asia, but stays and watches the ferries, and the book ends.
- Why it matters: The book’s last scene and the end of the trip; Bryson spells the park “Gilhane”. Set anywhere else, the book would lose its closing image of Europe’s edge.