Articles
Post-Modernist View of history in the works of Ihsan Oktay Anar
Olga Kareva
Vostok/Oriens '2013, №1
Ihsan Oktay Anar, born in 1960, is a fine representative of the “narrative”-type Turkish post-modernism of the late 20th – early 21st century. In his books he deals with the complex post-nonclassical philosophy by means of highly entertaining episodes from the history of Turkey and treats it with a touch of humor and satire. This makes his writings highly popular with the country’s very different (demanding and otherwise) audience. Ihsan Oktay Anar is a representative of the “second wave” of Turkish Postmodernism, his novels demonstrate a new approach to the understanding of history and the place of a human being in history in which the focus of literary research shifts to certain narrative structures. History and human beings are considered as cultural projects created through a variety of narrative strategies and discourse practices. They are flexible text formations that presuppose constant modifications of their meaning. Research into this kind of literature calls for not only traditional (structural and semantic) analysis but also new types of literary studies (narrative analysis etc.) involving communicative approach to the study of literature.
Keywords: Turkish narrative post-modernism, post-historical perspective, hyper character mask, Ihsan Oktay Anar
Pages: С. 81–86
