Books by Erol Köroğlu (Koroglu)
İletişim Yayınları, İstanbul, Jan 1, 2004
Throughout World War I the Entente Powers (France, Britain, Russia and later the USA) directed wi... more Throughout World War I the Entente Powers (France, Britain, Russia and later the USA) directed widespread efforts towards the generation of propaganda as a weapon of war, with devastating effect. However, in the underdeveloped and multi-ethnic Ottoman Empire, the Turkish intelligentsia could not produce adequate propaganda to support the war effort. As the war unfolded, writers abandoned their initial attempts at propaganda and turned instead to the task of defining a national identity. In this new reassessment of Turkish literature and propaganda in World War I, Erol Köroglu argues the Ottoman-Turkish intelligentsia used the conditions created by the war to eliminate the deficiencies in national culture and build a Turkish identity, a project inherited from the pre-war years.
New Perspectives on Turkey, no. 36, Spring 2007
Editors’ Introduction: Literature and the nation: Confronting unhealed wounds
Erol Köroğlu; Zafe... more Editors’ Introduction: Literature and the nation: Confronting unhealed wounds
Erol Köroğlu; Zafer Yenal; Deniz Yükseker
In the lecture he delivered at the award ceremony for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2006, Orhan Pamuk said: “For me, to be a writer is to acknowledge the secret wounds that we carry inside us, the wounds so secret that we ourselves are barely aware of them, and to patiently explore them, know them, illuminate them, to own these pains and wounds, and to make them a conscious part of our spirits and our writing.”[1] One can discern in his words an implied relationship between wounds of every kind—personal, physical, psychological, social and historical—on the one hand, and literature on the other. Writers often work through and explore the implications and consequences of these wounds not only for themselves or for other individuals, but also for society as a whole. In this context, literature is an act of acknowledgment, recognition and encounter, which in many cases involves confrontation as well. Located between the personal and the social, with their various emotional, sensual and mental manifestations, literature has the potential to break open questions and silences involved in the individual and collective experiences of past and present. This is not only an issue of mediation and reflection. Literature may also unsettle and, thus, serve to rework, historical and social circumstances by way of bringing to light the hidden, the silenced and the repressed, more often than not in a discomforting and disturbing manner.
This special issue of New Perspectives on Turkey on “Literature and the Nation” aims to look at one of the most debated issues in Turkey, namely the question of national identity and nationalism, through critical perspectives inspired by literature. In recent years, Turkish political and social life has been marked by public debates about how far one can guarantee the freedom of expression and cultural rights for ethnic and religious minorities, and whether past atrocities committed in the name of the nation can be acknowledged. Some of the bitterest discussions have been on the Kurdish issue and the massacre of Armenians in 1915. In the course of these discussions, questions pertaining to national identity and nationalism have come to occupy a central place. The political divide around the issue of Turkish national identity reached its apex after the assassination of Hrant Dink, the outspoken Turkish Armenian journalist, on January 19, 2007. On one level, the murder of Hrant Dink inflicted a fresh wound on the Turkish society’s collective memory of 1915. But on another (and equally troubling) level, the omnipresent national identity was used to quickly silence an emerging willingness to “explore, know, illuminate and own our pains and wounds” pertaining to 1915. There was, thus, a swift change in the public mood, from mourning Dink’s murder and raising for the first time the possibility of discussing the past—recall the slogan “We are all Armenians; we are all Hrant” chanted during the funeral procession numbering 100,000 mourners—to a vociferous attempt at preempting that possibility by nationalist political parties and constituencies—recall the slogans along the lines of “We are all Turks, we are all Mehmets” chanted at nationalist demonstrations.
We believe that it is a political urgency—and our intellectual responsibility—to intensify efforts to confront nationalism’s symbolic and physical violence which various social groups have experienced in the past and present. Needless to say, knowledge and understanding of the historical specificities of nationalism in Turkey occupy a central place in this endeavor. Looking at the past and the present through literature may help us to understand how the formation of discourses on nationalism and state-building processes have been inscribed in the historical experience and to see in what ways these inscriptions have become fundamental aspects in the constitution of the present.
In undertaking this task, this collection of articles seeks to make a scholarly contribution of a different order as well. The methodological and epistemological divide between literary studies and the social sciences was quite rigid until a few decades ago. As this gap has narrowed gradually, in Turkey as well as elsewhere, a new kind of scholarship has emerged, a scholarship that in examining important historical and socio-political issues cuts across previously rigid disciplinary boundaries. Many of the articles in this special issue on “Literature and the Nation” make a genuine effort to come to terms with some of the methodological and conceptual problems of truly melding together social science and literary studies.
The subject of nationalism especially lends itself to a blending of social science and literary studies approaches. Literature, and in particular the novel, has been one of the main vehicles for the consolidation and the popularization of the idea of the nation and national belonging. As such, literature has also played a part in imagining the nation—homogeneously, as was so often the case—hence suppressing voices of difference and dissent. Therefore, the appearance of modern literature and the building and imagining of the nation are almost coterminous processes. In the case of Turkey, a careful analysis of literary works produced in the republican era are illuminating in at least three respects: first, it is possible to find the traces of the aspirations, desires, ideas and ideals instrumental in the shaping of the literary canon that accompanied nation-building and -imagining. Secondly, studying literature may also be fruitful for understanding various dislocations, frustrations, grievances, violence, and disillusionment experienced by different social groups who were subjected to the power of the national state. Thirdly, reading texts with a particular sensitivity to the historical conditions in which they were produced is illuminating, not only for deciphering the traces of a monophonic discourse of nationalism, but also (and more importantly) for delineating its paradoxes and incongruities with the lived experience. Hence, this may also open up a space for coming to terms with the historical contingencies and pluralities that were sought to be silenced and erased in this process.
As the essays in this special issue, through a reading of various literary texts, tackle problems pertaining to the representation of the past and the building of a future, all of them, in a way, address the possibility of acknowledging our wounds. It is because of this common, if implicit, concern woven through the various essays in this special issue, that we dedicate it to the memory of Hrant Dink, who dared to call upon us all to explore and own our wounds—the self-inflicted ones as well as those inflicted by and to others—which have been left unhealed upon his death.
Bu kitabın başlangıç fikri, Boğaziçi Üniversitesi Türk Dili ve Edebiyatı Bölümü'nün 5-7 Mayıs 200... more Bu kitabın başlangıç fikri, Boğaziçi Üniversitesi Türk Dili ve Edebiyatı Bölümü'nün 5-7 Mayıs 2004'te düzenlediği bir sempozyumda ortaya çıktı. Sempozyum bildirilerinden yola çıkılarak oluşturulan makalelerin, "anlatı", "toplumsal cinsiyet", "mekan" ve "edebiyat tarihi" konularına göre gruplanmasıyla bu kitap oluştu. Bu kitap, öncelikle Ahmet Mithat, ancak aynı zamanda tüm bir Tanzimat dönemi edebiyatı ve modern edebiyatın kuruluşu konularında yeni ve verimli bir ilgiye yol açmayı hedefliyor. Kitabın hedef kitlesi önce Türk edebiyatı alanında çalışan araştırmacı ve öğrenciler, sonra beşeri bilimlerin diğer alanlarından okurlar olmakla birlikte, okuma eylemini ciddiye alan her alandan okuru da kapsamaktı. Bunu da yapmamak herhalde modern Türk okurlarının ilk öğretmeni olan Ahmet Mithat Efendi'ye ihanet etmek olurdu. Onu okumaya ve anlamaya yönelik bu kitap, onun pek çok eserini başlatırken kullandığı "Merhaba Ey Okur!" hitabına öykünerek, ona ses vermeyi amaçlıyor; "Merhaba Ey Muharrir!"
Hayata Bakan Edebiyat: Adalet Ağaoğlu'nun Yapıtlarına Eleştirel Yaklaşımlar
Lütfen şu linke gidiniz: https://www.academia.edu/28903829/Hayata_Bakan_Edebiyat_Adalet_A%C4%9Fao... more Lütfen şu linke gidiniz: https://www.academia.edu/28903829/Hayata_Bakan_Edebiyat_Adalet_A%C4%9Fao%C4%9Flunun_Yap%C4%B1tlar%C4%B1na_Ele%C5%9Ftirel_Yakla%C5%9F%C4%B1mlar
'Boğaziçi Üniversitesi Türk Dili ve Edebiyatı Bölümü tarafından 15 Mayıs 2002 tarihinde bir 'Adalet Ağaoğlu Sempozyumu' düzenlendi. Bu sempozyumda Adalet Ağaoğlu'nun eserleri üzerine sekiz tane bildiri sunuldu. Birkaç yıl önce de, 12-13 Aralık 1998'de ABD'de Ohio Eyalet Üniversitesi'nde Adalet Ağaoğlu'nun onuruna 'Çağdaşlık ve Toplumsal Değişim' başlıklı bir sempozyum düzenlenmiş ve burada da yazar hakkında sekiz bildiri verilmişti... Bildiriler Adalet Ağaoğlu'nun çeşitli eserleri hakkındaydı. Roman, anı, hikaye ve tiyatro oyunları ele alınıyordu.''
Ohio Eyalet Üniversitesi'nde sunulan bildirilerden ikisi bu kitaptan önce değişik biçimlerde yayımlandı. İkisi ise Türkçe'ye çevrilerek Boğaziçi'ndeki sempozyuma sunuldu.
Adalet Ağaoğlu'nun eserleri üzerine iki ayrı zamanda sunulan çalışmalardan, yayımlanmamış olanları, sadece yazılar arasında yazım ve noktalama birliği sağlanmaya çalışılarak elinizdeki bu kitapta toplanmıştır. Yayınevimiz önemli bir yazarımızın eserleri hakkındaki bu değerlendirme ve eleştirileri bir araya getirmekle edebiyat dünyamıza hizmet ettiğini düşünmektedir.
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Books by Erol Köroğlu (Koroglu)
Erol Köroğlu; Zafer Yenal; Deniz Yükseker
In the lecture he delivered at the award ceremony for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2006, Orhan Pamuk said: “For me, to be a writer is to acknowledge the secret wounds that we carry inside us, the wounds so secret that we ourselves are barely aware of them, and to patiently explore them, know them, illuminate them, to own these pains and wounds, and to make them a conscious part of our spirits and our writing.”[1] One can discern in his words an implied relationship between wounds of every kind—personal, physical, psychological, social and historical—on the one hand, and literature on the other. Writers often work through and explore the implications and consequences of these wounds not only for themselves or for other individuals, but also for society as a whole. In this context, literature is an act of acknowledgment, recognition and encounter, which in many cases involves confrontation as well. Located between the personal and the social, with their various emotional, sensual and mental manifestations, literature has the potential to break open questions and silences involved in the individual and collective experiences of past and present. This is not only an issue of mediation and reflection. Literature may also unsettle and, thus, serve to rework, historical and social circumstances by way of bringing to light the hidden, the silenced and the repressed, more often than not in a discomforting and disturbing manner.
This special issue of New Perspectives on Turkey on “Literature and the Nation” aims to look at one of the most debated issues in Turkey, namely the question of national identity and nationalism, through critical perspectives inspired by literature. In recent years, Turkish political and social life has been marked by public debates about how far one can guarantee the freedom of expression and cultural rights for ethnic and religious minorities, and whether past atrocities committed in the name of the nation can be acknowledged. Some of the bitterest discussions have been on the Kurdish issue and the massacre of Armenians in 1915. In the course of these discussions, questions pertaining to national identity and nationalism have come to occupy a central place. The political divide around the issue of Turkish national identity reached its apex after the assassination of Hrant Dink, the outspoken Turkish Armenian journalist, on January 19, 2007. On one level, the murder of Hrant Dink inflicted a fresh wound on the Turkish society’s collective memory of 1915. But on another (and equally troubling) level, the omnipresent national identity was used to quickly silence an emerging willingness to “explore, know, illuminate and own our pains and wounds” pertaining to 1915. There was, thus, a swift change in the public mood, from mourning Dink’s murder and raising for the first time the possibility of discussing the past—recall the slogan “We are all Armenians; we are all Hrant” chanted during the funeral procession numbering 100,000 mourners—to a vociferous attempt at preempting that possibility by nationalist political parties and constituencies—recall the slogans along the lines of “We are all Turks, we are all Mehmets” chanted at nationalist demonstrations.
We believe that it is a political urgency—and our intellectual responsibility—to intensify efforts to confront nationalism’s symbolic and physical violence which various social groups have experienced in the past and present. Needless to say, knowledge and understanding of the historical specificities of nationalism in Turkey occupy a central place in this endeavor. Looking at the past and the present through literature may help us to understand how the formation of discourses on nationalism and state-building processes have been inscribed in the historical experience and to see in what ways these inscriptions have become fundamental aspects in the constitution of the present.
In undertaking this task, this collection of articles seeks to make a scholarly contribution of a different order as well. The methodological and epistemological divide between literary studies and the social sciences was quite rigid until a few decades ago. As this gap has narrowed gradually, in Turkey as well as elsewhere, a new kind of scholarship has emerged, a scholarship that in examining important historical and socio-political issues cuts across previously rigid disciplinary boundaries. Many of the articles in this special issue on “Literature and the Nation” make a genuine effort to come to terms with some of the methodological and conceptual problems of truly melding together social science and literary studies.
The subject of nationalism especially lends itself to a blending of social science and literary studies approaches. Literature, and in particular the novel, has been one of the main vehicles for the consolidation and the popularization of the idea of the nation and national belonging. As such, literature has also played a part in imagining the nation—homogeneously, as was so often the case—hence suppressing voices of difference and dissent. Therefore, the appearance of modern literature and the building and imagining of the nation are almost coterminous processes. In the case of Turkey, a careful analysis of literary works produced in the republican era are illuminating in at least three respects: first, it is possible to find the traces of the aspirations, desires, ideas and ideals instrumental in the shaping of the literary canon that accompanied nation-building and -imagining. Secondly, studying literature may also be fruitful for understanding various dislocations, frustrations, grievances, violence, and disillusionment experienced by different social groups who were subjected to the power of the national state. Thirdly, reading texts with a particular sensitivity to the historical conditions in which they were produced is illuminating, not only for deciphering the traces of a monophonic discourse of nationalism, but also (and more importantly) for delineating its paradoxes and incongruities with the lived experience. Hence, this may also open up a space for coming to terms with the historical contingencies and pluralities that were sought to be silenced and erased in this process.
As the essays in this special issue, through a reading of various literary texts, tackle problems pertaining to the representation of the past and the building of a future, all of them, in a way, address the possibility of acknowledging our wounds. It is because of this common, if implicit, concern woven through the various essays in this special issue, that we dedicate it to the memory of Hrant Dink, who dared to call upon us all to explore and own our wounds—the self-inflicted ones as well as those inflicted by and to others—which have been left unhealed upon his death.
'Boğaziçi Üniversitesi Türk Dili ve Edebiyatı Bölümü tarafından 15 Mayıs 2002 tarihinde bir 'Adalet Ağaoğlu Sempozyumu' düzenlendi. Bu sempozyumda Adalet Ağaoğlu'nun eserleri üzerine sekiz tane bildiri sunuldu. Birkaç yıl önce de, 12-13 Aralık 1998'de ABD'de Ohio Eyalet Üniversitesi'nde Adalet Ağaoğlu'nun onuruna 'Çağdaşlık ve Toplumsal Değişim' başlıklı bir sempozyum düzenlenmiş ve burada da yazar hakkında sekiz bildiri verilmişti... Bildiriler Adalet Ağaoğlu'nun çeşitli eserleri hakkındaydı. Roman, anı, hikaye ve tiyatro oyunları ele alınıyordu.''
Ohio Eyalet Üniversitesi'nde sunulan bildirilerden ikisi bu kitaptan önce değişik biçimlerde yayımlandı. İkisi ise Türkçe'ye çevrilerek Boğaziçi'ndeki sempozyuma sunuldu.
Adalet Ağaoğlu'nun eserleri üzerine iki ayrı zamanda sunulan çalışmalardan, yayımlanmamış olanları, sadece yazılar arasında yazım ve noktalama birliği sağlanmaya çalışılarak elinizdeki bu kitapta toplanmıştır. Yayınevimiz önemli bir yazarımızın eserleri hakkındaki bu değerlendirme ve eleştirileri bir araya getirmekle edebiyat dünyamıza hizmet ettiğini düşünmektedir.