Uncoupling Language and Religion : An Exploration into the Margins of Turkish Literature
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This book is an invitation to rethink our understanding of Turkish literature as a tale of two "others." The first part of the book examines the contributions of non-Muslim authors, the "others" of modern Turkey, to the development of Turkish literature during the late Ottoman and early republican period, focusing on the works of largely forgotten authors. The second part discusses Turkey as the "other" of the West and the way authors writing in Turkish challenged orientalist representations. Thus this book prepares the ground for a history of literature which uncouples language and religion and recreates the spaces of dialogue and exchange that have existed in late Ottoman Turkey between members of various ethno-religious communities.
“Uncoupling Language and Religion deals with topics, authors, and works of literature in Turkish that have long been neglected by Turkish and international literary historiography. The ‘uncoupling’ of language (Turkish) from religion (Islam) allows for the discussion of ‘forgotten’ themes and authors who were important agents during the formation period of modern Turkish literature in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. By looking at the works of Turkish-speaking Armenian, Greek, and Jewish writers as well as of Turkish-Muslim writers who had controversial ideas about the republican national ideology, layers in this literature become visible that prove the multifaceted connection between Turkish and European cultural and intellectual history. The question of what role religion played in the formation process of modern Turkish literature—not only Islam, but all three monotheistic world religions which existed side by side in the Ottoman Empire—is a particularly interesting subject in that context.”
—Börte Sagaster, Associate Professor, Department of Turkish and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Cyprus
“Laurent Mignon proposes a new, non-comprehensive, version of Turkish literary history which takes into consideration ongoing debates about the re-evaluation of the canon. He focuses on one century of works in Turkish starting in the 1850s, and sheds light on lesser-known and lesser-read authors selected from the heart of a still little-known history of literature in Turkey. Marginalized, forgotten or dismissed literati, often overlooked in the studies on a post-imperial culture generally considered to be monolingual, are at the heart of this study which reveals the radical originality of those authors who bridged the long period between the end of the decaying empire and the early years of the burgeoning Republic. This study also uncovers the fascinating intermingling of languages and alphabets that were quickly obliterated by the new cultural policies of Mustafa Kemal’s autocratic state. The ‘wall of unspokenness,’ to borrow a term coined by the novelist Bilge Karasu (1930-1995), surrounding non-Muslim and women’s literary contributions, is here challenged: Prof. Laurent Mignon manages to introduce a fascinating and unchartered continent to Western readers, fueling our desire for more ‘refuse and ruins of history.’”
—Timour Muhidine, Associate Professor, Inalco, Paris
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