Tweet
Today's Zaman, Turkey
Aug 25 2013
White Turk literature
In an effort to clear my head of the heavy political agenda at home
and in the region, I decided to dig into some `light reading' during
my limited vacation time.
I've always enjoyed reading novels, but since I can't allocate the
uninterrupted periods of time that I believe are necessary for
pleasant novel-reading during workdays, I hardly ever get to read one.
Last week, I bought three popular novels after asking the opinion of a
young shopkeeper at a local bookstore in a semi-rural town near
Ä°stanbul. I read one each day.
Although I had watched a movie based on a book by Kemalist musician
and author Zülfü Livaneli, I can't recall having read any of his
books. His latest best-selling novel, `Serenad' (Serenade), flows
easily, but Livaneli's effort to transmit messages about almost all of
life's issues through the novel's main character, an urban, highly
educated, secular Turkish woman whose grandmother turns out to be
Armenian, is discomforting. Livaneli, a renowned Kemalist himself,
duly criticizes the 1915 mass killings of Armenians, Holocaust
tragedies and a massive campaign of plunder and lynching of Ä°stanbul's
non-Muslim minorities that eventually led to a significant decrease in
their numbers in Sept. 6-7, 1955, but ironically fails to hold the
country's ruling Kemalist ideology responsible for excluding `certain
citizens' throughout the republican era.
I must admit that I was a bit biased against the second novel I read
because the author, Hande Altaylı, is the relatively young wife of the
editor-in-chief of a leading newspaper, Habertürk. (I thought she
might have used that as an advantage in getting herself a place in the
news.) It was a pleasant surprise to find that the book was actually a
good read. `AÅ?ka Å?eytan KarıÅ?ır' (The Devil Meddles in Love) gave me
the impression that it was the Ä°stanbul version of the New York-based
stories in `Sex and the City.' Although Turkish cities are awash with
urban, independent and `modern' women living in solitude, they are not
the rule, despite the impression one gets while reading this book. The
book deals with love affairs that sometimes turn into obsessions as
well as issues of loyalty and infidelity.
The third novel was written by a well-known and popular author, AyÅ?e
Kulin, whose work I was already familiar with. Her latest novel,
`DönüÅ?' (Return), also immediately hit the top shelves of the
best-seller list. It was a good read for vacation, but the abundance
of political messages in this 2013 book surprised me. A character
presented as an architect in the story openly criticized Prime
Minister Recep Tayyip ErdoÄ?an over the building of the Çamlıca mosque.
The same character complained about arbitrary urbanization projects
and the allocation of state contracts to private firms without due
process.
Although I agree with some of the criticism regarding urbanization
issues, I couldn't help but think that ErdoÄ?an has clearly turned into
a symbol of hatred for White Turks. In other words, ErdoÄ?an has become
the only scapegoat for all the problems White Turks complain about.
The author is a good example of a Western-educated, secular, second-
or third-generation urbanized White Turk. Consequently, it's no news
that she doesn't like ErdoÄ?an, but it was striking to come across
these political messages in a novel that mainly deals with family
issues.
None of the three novels are masterpieces, of course, but they make
for easy and enjoyable reading on the road or on vacation. Since they
are in Turkish, I don't expect non-Turkish readers to read them. Then
why did I mention them? Because all three are interesting examples of
`White Turk literature' in Turkey. Although they target a broad
audience, they hardly tell stories about the average person in Turkey.
All of the characters are highly educated urbanites with high incomes
and very secular lifestyles. There is no trace of religion in their
daily lives, and there is a lot of alcohol consumption, something that
is not very common in average Turkish households. Of course, every
author is entitled to write whatever he or she sees fit, but the
uniformity of the characters and their stark detachment from the
`other Turkey' was impossible to overlook.
Why is mainstream literature dominated by White Turk authors, who rule
the best-seller lists? Probably because the White Turks are able to
invest in their children's education and foster their early interest
in the arts, while Black Turks are still mostly rural. As a result, it
might be unfair to expect these authors to reflect the `other.'
However, since the mid-1980s a hybrid class has begun to emerge in
Turkey. Apparently, it's time to start writing about their stories,
which have long gone unnoticed.
If you want to read more about what I mean by hybrid Turks, please
read the story here:
http://www.todayszaman.com/news-288628-a-new-class-of-hybrid-turks-emerging-between-white-and-black-turks.html
http://www.todayszaman.com/columnistDetail_getNewsById.action?newsId=324471
Aug 25 2013
White Turk literature
In an effort to clear my head of the heavy political agenda at home
and in the region, I decided to dig into some `light reading' during
my limited vacation time.
I've always enjoyed reading novels, but since I can't allocate the
uninterrupted periods of time that I believe are necessary for
pleasant novel-reading during workdays, I hardly ever get to read one.
Last week, I bought three popular novels after asking the opinion of a
young shopkeeper at a local bookstore in a semi-rural town near
Ä°stanbul. I read one each day.
Although I had watched a movie based on a book by Kemalist musician
and author Zülfü Livaneli, I can't recall having read any of his
books. His latest best-selling novel, `Serenad' (Serenade), flows
easily, but Livaneli's effort to transmit messages about almost all of
life's issues through the novel's main character, an urban, highly
educated, secular Turkish woman whose grandmother turns out to be
Armenian, is discomforting. Livaneli, a renowned Kemalist himself,
duly criticizes the 1915 mass killings of Armenians, Holocaust
tragedies and a massive campaign of plunder and lynching of Ä°stanbul's
non-Muslim minorities that eventually led to a significant decrease in
their numbers in Sept. 6-7, 1955, but ironically fails to hold the
country's ruling Kemalist ideology responsible for excluding `certain
citizens' throughout the republican era.
I must admit that I was a bit biased against the second novel I read
because the author, Hande Altaylı, is the relatively young wife of the
editor-in-chief of a leading newspaper, Habertürk. (I thought she
might have used that as an advantage in getting herself a place in the
news.) It was a pleasant surprise to find that the book was actually a
good read. `AÅ?ka Å?eytan KarıÅ?ır' (The Devil Meddles in Love) gave me
the impression that it was the Ä°stanbul version of the New York-based
stories in `Sex and the City.' Although Turkish cities are awash with
urban, independent and `modern' women living in solitude, they are not
the rule, despite the impression one gets while reading this book. The
book deals with love affairs that sometimes turn into obsessions as
well as issues of loyalty and infidelity.
The third novel was written by a well-known and popular author, AyÅ?e
Kulin, whose work I was already familiar with. Her latest novel,
`DönüÅ?' (Return), also immediately hit the top shelves of the
best-seller list. It was a good read for vacation, but the abundance
of political messages in this 2013 book surprised me. A character
presented as an architect in the story openly criticized Prime
Minister Recep Tayyip ErdoÄ?an over the building of the Çamlıca mosque.
The same character complained about arbitrary urbanization projects
and the allocation of state contracts to private firms without due
process.
Although I agree with some of the criticism regarding urbanization
issues, I couldn't help but think that ErdoÄ?an has clearly turned into
a symbol of hatred for White Turks. In other words, ErdoÄ?an has become
the only scapegoat for all the problems White Turks complain about.
The author is a good example of a Western-educated, secular, second-
or third-generation urbanized White Turk. Consequently, it's no news
that she doesn't like ErdoÄ?an, but it was striking to come across
these political messages in a novel that mainly deals with family
issues.
None of the three novels are masterpieces, of course, but they make
for easy and enjoyable reading on the road or on vacation. Since they
are in Turkish, I don't expect non-Turkish readers to read them. Then
why did I mention them? Because all three are interesting examples of
`White Turk literature' in Turkey. Although they target a broad
audience, they hardly tell stories about the average person in Turkey.
All of the characters are highly educated urbanites with high incomes
and very secular lifestyles. There is no trace of religion in their
daily lives, and there is a lot of alcohol consumption, something that
is not very common in average Turkish households. Of course, every
author is entitled to write whatever he or she sees fit, but the
uniformity of the characters and their stark detachment from the
`other Turkey' was impossible to overlook.
Why is mainstream literature dominated by White Turk authors, who rule
the best-seller lists? Probably because the White Turks are able to
invest in their children's education and foster their early interest
in the arts, while Black Turks are still mostly rural. As a result, it
might be unfair to expect these authors to reflect the `other.'
However, since the mid-1980s a hybrid class has begun to emerge in
Turkey. Apparently, it's time to start writing about their stories,
which have long gone unnoticed.
If you want to read more about what I mean by hybrid Turks, please
read the story here:
http://www.todayszaman.com/news-288628-a-new-class-of-hybrid-turks-emerging-between-white-and-black-turks.html
http://www.todayszaman.com/columnistDetail_getNewsById.action?newsId=324471