Learning to Read tells the story of learning to read against the background of the transition from Ottoman Empire to Turkish Republic. It begins with the premise that the history of learning to read and reading, remarkably understudied for this region given its importance, can tell us much about the arrival of the modern period in general and the Ottoman-to-Republican transformation in particular. Investigating by turns the messages imparted to young readers, the experience of mastering the basic mechanics of reading, the arrival of new types of reading materials, the role of illustration, the emergence of books and magazines as commodities and the ways in which literacy changed people's lives, this book provides a multifaceted approach to reading during a period of rapid change. It demonstrates the reading's crucial importance to the modern history of Turkey.