(6)The author offers glimpses of a more satisfying book. ▲She includes a suggestive aside on the blending of French and Persian inspirations in the Ottoman palace-building of the early 18th century—as good an emblem for the empire's strained multiculturalism as you could wish for. There are ★tantalising[10] allusions to both the fascination and the repulsion which animated the later Ottomans' ★ambivalence[11] t___ ⑤ ___ Europe. And one wishes that (7)Ms Finkel had developed her intriguing defence of the empire in the 19th century, “multi-confessional, geographically incoherent and economically backward”▲, in the face of demands, on the part of ★impertinent[12] Europeans, that it reform internally.

相比之前，这本书还是有不少出彩之处。作者在文中特意提到，18世纪初期奥斯曼兴建王宫时，曾融合了法国人和波斯人的灵感——这种糅合再好不过地寓示了奥斯曼帝国牵强的多文化主义色彩。书中引经据典描述了奥斯曼人对外来文化的着迷和排斥，生动再现了奥斯曼人后期对欧洲的矛盾心态，很是引人入胜。芬克尔女士辩解说，对于作为旁观者的欧洲人而言，19世纪的奥斯曼帝国“教义信仰多样化、地域不连贯，甚而经济倒退”，完全是为形势所迫。这一观点令人感到好奇，有人希望芬克尔女士应当进一步展开阐述。（文中的that it reform internally令人匪夷所思，尤其是主语为单数it，而reform又给出复数形式，为什么呢？）