Turkish Literature

I haven't read a book that was so difficult to set aside when my evil demon told me to get back into reality and the duties of everyday life, in a long time. Elif Shafak does beautiful work in telling an exciting story, providing cultural insight, making bold statements, and creating a need to learn more about two cultures that seem so distant, but in actuality aren't.

Elif Shafak is Turkish, was born in France, and has lived in numerous places over on the globe, partially due to her diplomatic family. Even though she is Turkish, still she includes the Armenian story in her novel. The stories taking place in her novel are not only exciting and a thrill to read, but also responsible. By making bold statements about the status of women, and confronting the Armenian genocide, she writes about subjects that many others would try to avoid or not know how to tactfully discuss within a novel.
While reading both The Bastard of Istanbul and Orhan Pamuk's The White Castle, I became more and more intrigued about the history and culture of Turkey, including the Kurdish and Armenian populations. The more I learn about Turkey, the more I want to know. By reading on one subject, many other subjects are involved that I need to know about in order to fully understand the first. It's very exciting! I hope that the high school students who might be reading Turkish literature will be this excited, too.

While Shafak describes the Turkish and Armenian conflict, in addition to the tradition vs. modernity dilemma that many people in Istanbul face, Pamuk discusses the eastern and westerner cultural clash. In Pamuk's The White Castle, two men, one Italian, the other Turkish, look astonishingly alike. That's because they are more alike than they like to admit. Only when they begin to acknowledge their similarities do they start to respect and understand one another. The Italian represents the West, or the Occident, while the Turk stands for the East/Orient.

Both novels deal with issues significant to the identity of Turkey, in specifically Istanbul. An identity that seems to be well defined - Turkey as a bridge between East and West - that is still worth discussing. Most literature and film that describes Turkey, inevitably describes an identity "dilemma."