Pamuk receives French Legion d'honneur order of Merit

Turkey's Nobel Laureate Orhan Pamuk received the French Legion d'honneur order of merit in a ceremony on Sunday.  The order wase presented to Pamuk by French Culture Minister Aurelie Flippetti. Speaking at the ceremony, Flippetti said that Pamuk’s novels have been translated to many languages and read by millions of people. Flippetti added that she was especially impressed by his novels mainly depicting Istanbul. For his part, Pamuk said that his novels have been translated to 61 languages and the first translation was carried out by a French publication house, when he was 30 years old. Touching on relations between Turkey and France, Pamuk stressed that the Ottoman-Turks looked at France as a model in political Westernization.