Tanıl Bora: “Literature has always played a role in the construction of nation-states”

Samsun University Centre of Art and Thought hosted Tanıl Bora, moderated by Servet Gündoğdu and Kaan Kurt within the scope of “Öteki Buluşmalar” 2021. With his speech titled “Political Ideologies and Literature” on an online program, Bora explained the relationship between politics and literature, politics and aesthetics, power relations and art, and his evaluations on the book Cereyanlar, which occasionally touches upon these relations.

Tanıl Bora started his speech by saying “Today, I will give a speech mainly based on the book named ‘Cereyanlar’ that deals with the history of political ideologies in Turkey but without relying solely on it.” He then continued as “What was the relationship between political ideologies and literature in Turkey? I will focus on a few points that I think are worth discussing in terms of political ideology and our world of ideas when we look at the carriage of political ideologies in literature and our literature. I thought it would be more practical to proceed with a few topics. Because in Turkish literature, this terminology preference should also be a separate, discussable topic-national literature or -we can say- construction period, literature that is the half painting of Turkey’s construction as a nation state and as a modern state should be the first corpus to get first. Literature has always played an important role in the birth of all nationalisms and the construction of all nation-states. Romantic literature emerged from this historical experience. This is also true in Turkey as it is in the world. When we look at early Republican period, we see that it is also true for the large part of this period’s literature especially if we leave out popular literature -we can also see motifs about new Turkey in foundation period in popular literature. We can think that the strongest and most enduring figure of this period was Yakup Kadri.”

“Tarık Buğra makes a reading of the Republic from a conservative perspective”

Continuing his words by saying ” It would be interesting to read Yakup Kadri and Reşat Nuri together.”, Bora said, ” Because Yakup Kadri is more devoted and more identified with the regime. While Yakup Kadri deals with all of these with a direct political interest in his novels, we see a more indirect expression in Reşat Nuri. I think we should remember the name Tarık Buğra here. Tarık Buğra makes an alternative reading of the “Republic” in his novels from a view that we can call conservative against the themes of Yakup Kadri or other writers. This is something represented by Tarık Bugra and it is also beyond him. It is a literature of survival and republic and includes somehow nationalist chauvinism. So, there is a chauvinist nationalist narrative, agitation, and propaganda. This is literature that wants to caress and embellish people’s national feelings and feelings about the idea of the republic. Speaking of chauvinist nationalism, I can say a few words about nationalist literature. This is a literature that starts with the Turkish nationalism of the early Republican period and proceeds in the historical transformation of that line. Mainly it depends heavily on heroism. Let me exaggerate a little, there is literature that is almost about heroism. From Atsız to Mustafa Necati Sepetçioğlu.”

“Islamism did not have an ambitious production in the novel”

Speaking about the relationship between Islamism and literature, Bora said, “In the awakening of Islamism after the Second World War with the transition to the multi-party regime, the role of the literati is particularly great. We call them literati, but the role of poets is very dominant in them. I think we can talk about four generations of poets, but very close to each other. First of all, Necip Fazıl, then Sezai Karakoç, then poet Zarifoğlu of Maraş who published Mavera magazine, Özdenörens, İnans and İsmet Özel in the next generation. In Turkey from the end of the ’30s and till 70’s there are many journals and authors of Islamic thought. But poets are particularly prominent. This is especially true when it comes to Necip Fazıl. Necip Fazıl’s poems are actually in the form of an anthem. Necip Fazıl was influential with his prose rather than his poems. Sezai Karakoç’s prose is quite didactic. We should also remember Nuri Pakdil. In his poetry, we see a poem that can be called more abstract, which opens the horizon of human thought and emotion towards metaphysics rather than a poem that gives a message. We also see such a difference between İsmet Özel’s prose and poetry. İsmet Özel’s poem is an abstract poem that has its metaphysics. His prose is more didactic and agitative. For a long time, the novel has been an area that has not been effectively produced by the Islamist community. We can say that Islamism did not have an assertive production claiming a peak in the novel as well as in poetry.”

“The relationship established with humanism was a bridge towards the leftist idea”

Continuing his words by saying “Let’s get to the issue of left-wing thought with literature,” Bora talked about a few themes under a few headings: “One of them is humanist literature till  at least the ’60s, perhaps even longer. There was a reading of the classics of world literature and literature that we could put in the frame of thought that we can call humanist in general. It acted as a bridge, especially in times when left-wing thought was forbidden and under more pressure. Literal cannot identify but undoubtedly read the classics, reading the classics of world literature, read humanist literature, flirting with a leftist ideology or to insert the idea that Turkey, served as a bridge of heading them to sympathy. A more nationalist oriented towards humanist literature, he found the opposite of thinking of the iscourse that slandered that literature as a bridge to leftism, irreligion, immorality, alienation.  For one thing, there was such an indirect left-literature relationship.”

Apart from that, for a long time on the left, literature opened the doors for people to sympathize with the left, define themselves as leftists, socialists, communists, and seek their ways. We need to mention a few columns from a few branches. One of them is Nazım Hikmet that will come to mind for everyone.

“Nâzım Hikmet poetized the socialist view without being agitative and didactic”

Saying ” With the influence of Nazım Hikmet’s poetry and the high ability of his worldview and aesthetics, especially when you read his epics, he poetizes the socialist worldview.”, Bora continued his words as follows: “We see a mastery that says this very naturally, appeals to the emotions but does not do it in an agitative and didactic way. But beyond this literary power, his fame and legend also had an affect. His being a world-famous poet, his long imprisonment, his escape, the controversy around him, and indeed his worldwide reputation was also effective. Another column is the “social realism” trend. We can take Orhan Kemal as the most classical and typical representative. We can also take Yaşar Kemal.

“Aziz Nesin gave a type of social realism with his satirical literature”

Asking the question “What is social realism?”, Bora said, ” Literature that explicitly describes the distortions, contradictions, class contradictions, poverty, human degeneration that appear there from the left point of view, without romanticizing and hiding the reality of society. We can also consider village novels written by the Village Institute writers as a subtitle. We need to talk about another person who represents that genre very strongly, and that is Aziz Nesin. Aziz Nesin also gave a kind of social realism with his satire literature. He also cited the contradictions in society, especially his observations on inequality and social exploitation from the left perspective. His stories satirizing the state and the state order had a tremendous impact. In other words, the literature of Aziz Nesin, which has influenced more people than many political texts and magazines for several generations, is worth mentioning on its own.”

“Atilla İlhan and Vedat Türkali wrote novels containing the debates on the left-wing thoughts”

Tanıl Bora, who also talked about the novels that tell the story of Turkey Communist Party, said, “Some novels by Attila İlhan and especially some of Vedat Türkali can be listed here. This is, of course, a highly subjective issue regarding the history of the left. But that’s old left, is the story of what happened to both Turkey banned the Communist Party and the inner struggle, our literature from this perspective creates an interesting type. This is a genre, a category that should be noted to concern the debates in the left’s realm, its universe, rather than its effect of calling people to the left.

Continuing his words by saying ” We know that social realism is more of a literature about modern times.”, Bora also said: As nationalist literature builds a narrative based on old times about the historical and social structure of Turkey, left also have examples of literary experiments about the older roots of the societal structure of Turkey, since Ottomans. You can see the traces of this even in Yaşar Kemal.

Kemal Tahir, who can be considered as a title in itself, free from any political positioning, also comes to mind.

“Literature played an important role in the formation of feminist thought”

Bora said, “Another topic that should be considered very important is the role of literature in the formation of feminism, feminist thought, and sensitivity. I specifically mean the literature made by young women writers in the ’60s and ’70s. Namely, Adalet Ağaoğlu, Leyla Erbil, Sevim Burak, Sevgi Soysal. I think Sevgi Soysal is more dominant here. She never uses the concept of feminism, but we see in her texts that she expresses the oppression of women and that she tries hard to see it as a political problem. A significant part of these writers’ novels are about private one, home life, women’s self-esteem, confinement or identification with home, women’s identification with housework and the unwanted voice of her, her observations on private life, love relationships, private life on female-male relationships. They tell this in a politicized way in their novel. Feminist thought came up after September 12th in Turkey and it accelerated, it became stronger and made itself accepted.”

“Zaven Biberyan should come to mind when it comes to minority literature”

Continuing his words by saying “It is necessary to take into account the literature which deals with the advanced stages of the modernization experience and some top writers.”, Bora said, “Oğuz Atay comes to my mind first. Tanpınar, which was discovered with an even greater delay after Oğuz Atay was discovered with a little delay, comes to my mind. Their novels are those in which modernization, modern society, the modern individual issue, the East-West issue are tampered with as humanitarian issues. You know the concept of minor literature, this is a concept Deleuze made famous. It does not mean “minority literature” You know, the minor tells us the small tone, the small vocalism. Yusuf Atılgan comes to my mind, Bilge Karasu comes to my mind. I said minor does not mean minority. But there is also “minority literature”, about the lives of non-Muslim minorities in Turkey. In particular, Zaven Biberyan deserves to be mentioned as a summit. It tells stories that take place within the Armenian community of Istanbul. He is a very powerful writer where you can find both Yusuf Atılgan and Orhan Kemal. On the anniversary of the murder of Hrant Dink, I wanted to specifically mention Zaven Biberyan. This is political literature in itself, a title of political literature even with its subject alone.” said.

The talk titled “Political Ideologies and Literature” ended with the active participation, questions, and contributions of the audience.