Orhan Pamuk, Secularism and Blasphemy

Erdağ Göknar is Assistant Professor of Turkish Studies at Duke University and the award-winning translator of Orhan Pamuk’s My Name is Red. He holds a Ph.D. in Near and Middle Eastern studies and has published various critical articles on Turkish literary culture. He is also the translator of A.H. Tanpınar’s novel of Turkish modernity A Mind at Peace and co-editor of Mediterranean Passages: Readings from Dido to Derrida (North Carolina, 2008).

"In what sense is Orhan Pamuk, under fire by his government for "insulting Turkishness," Turkey's most representative national author in the literary world system? Orhan Pamuk, Secularism and Blasphemy addresses this conundrum, focusing on Pamuk's literary technique as a mode of political engagement that confounds antinomies between secular state (devlet) and politically enfranchised Islam (din), regionalism and cosmopolitanism, Kemalism and Turkism. Drawing on writings not yet accessible to Anglophone readers, as well as on the masterworks - The Black Book, My Name is Red, Snow - Erdag Göknar traces Pamuk's adventures in "postsecular" fictional form. Whether Pamuk is seen transforming the Empire-to-Republic Bildungsroman, fusing the novel with the Sufi tale, or depicting Istanbul as an archive in which Ottoman and Islamic memories are entered into disruptive, anachronistic relation with present modernities, he emerges as a remarkable fabulist of new literary cartographies.Göknar argues persuasively that Pamuk's writings have become a political flashpoint the world over because they are spellbindingly 'blasphemous' in truly unpredictable ways, which is to say, as volatile, translational spaces of the "secular-sacred." This lucidly written and comprehensive study of Pamuk's oeuvre is essential reading for all those interested in the politics of the novel, Turkish literary history, and the stakes of critical secularism in comparative literature today."Emily Apter, New York University (author of The Translation Zone. A New Comparative Literature)"Orhan Pamuk, Secularism and Blasphemy analyzes more than the Turkish Nobel laureate, more than the Turkish novel, and more than Turkish politics.It makes sense of the contradictory interactions among Pamuk, his writing, his homeland’s Ottoman past and present anxieties about the role of Islam in a secular state.Göknar helps us better understand Pamuk and Turkey by highlighting the politics of literary life in a globalizing age."Walter Andrews, University of Washington (author of The Age of Beloveds: Love and the Beloved in Early Modern Ottoman Culture and Society) "The greatest strength of Göknar’s study is the insight he provides into Pamuk’s position within the tradition of Turkish literary and cultural modernity. Göknar’s vast knowledge of Turkish literature and Ottoman culture provides a crucial context for reading Pamuk’s novels. To be sure, there are other paths to exploring Pamuk and his literary influences—his essays and memoirs are full of references to and reverence for European literature and modernity, so to ignore them would be a disservice to any scholarly reading. However, Göknar has provided a much needed corrective to those who seek to read Pamuk primarily from a Western perspective, as well as to those in Turkey who argue that he has betrayed his own literary and cultural heritage. As such, Orhan Pamuk, Secularism and Blasphemy should be required reading for anyone who wishes to understand one of contemporary literature’s most important voices."David N. Coury, University of Wisconsin-Green BayCritCom, Council for European Studies

• Part I: Tropes of "Turkishness" from Islam to State 1. Literary Revisions of the Secular Modern 2. The Untranslated Novels of a Nobel Laureate Part II: The Archive of Ottoman Istanbul 3. A Voice from the Ottoman Archive 4. Reimagining the Ottoman Legacy Part III: The Literary Politics of the Secular-Sacred 5. Political Parody from Coups to Conspiracy 6. Novelizing Secular Sufism Conclusion The Blasphemies of 'turning Turk'