MACMILLAN Right to the City Novels in Turkish Literature from the 1960s to the Present (Literary Urban Studies)

Right to the City Novels in Turkish Literature from the 1960s to the Present analyses the representation of rural migration to Istanbul in literature, placing Henri Lefebvre’s concept of the right to the city at the centre of the argument. Using a framework of critical urban theory, the book examines Orhan Kemal’s Gurbet Kuşları [The Homesick Birds] (1962); Muzaffer İzgü’s Halo Dayı ve İki Öküz [Uncle Halo and Two Oxen] (1973); Latife Tekin’s Berci Kristin Çöp Masalları [Berji Kristin: Tales From the Garbage Hills] (1984); Metin Kaçan’s Ağır Roman [Heavy Roman(i)] (1990); Ayhan Geçgin’s Kenarda [On the Periphery] (2003); Hatice Meryem’s İnsan Kısım Kısım, Yer Damar Damar [It Takes All Kinds] (2008); and Orhan Pamuk’s Kafamda Bir Tuhaflık [A Strangeness in My Mind] (2014) in the historical context as regards rural migration to Istanbul, urbanization of migrants, and anti-migrant nostalgia. Situating these works as a counterpoint to nostalgic novels and categorising them as right to the city novels, the book aims to offer a conceptual framework that can be implemented on internal as well as international migration in other global(ising) cities; and on cultural products other than literature, such as film. Review “The conceptualization of migration and urban integration as an interactive process between the real and the imagined would open up new channels of dialogue between cultural and literary studies and recent approaches to urban studies such as Assemblage and/or Actor Network Theory. On the other hand, the rich interpretive critical analysis and comparisons would produce useful insights and keywords for those who wish to study the same texts with the new tools of digital humanities such as text mining pattern recognition. Right to the City Novels in Turkish Literature from the 1960s to the Present will, in all likelihood, be an invaluable reference for all those students who wish to formulate new research questions in urban and cultural studies in general and in the field of migration studies in particular.” ( Murat Güvenç, Director of Istanbul Studies Center, Kadir Has University, Istanbul)  “N. Buket Cengiz analyses, with refreshing clarity, the extremely dynamic, sophisticated, and impressive representations of Istanbul’s rural migrants in modern Turkish novel. The narratological close readings of seven novels are enriched with an interpretation based on associations with sociology, political science, history, and urban studies of modern Turkey. Cengiz’s clever and satisfying work shows that novelists are not content with simply observing the challenging adventures of rural migrants in Istanbul and representing their experiences in fiction. These novelists also introduce opportunities to millions of citizens, mostly children or grandchildren of these migrants, to seek the possibilities of a more democratic and sharing urban existence. With her book, N. Buket Cengiz offers a qualified interdisciplinary work stemming from literary studies, and invites her readers to imagine a different and liveable city.” (Erol Köroğlu, Associate Professor, Department of Turkish Language and Literature, Bosporus University, Istanbul) From the Back Cover Right to the City Novels in Turkish Literature from the 1960s to the Present analyses the representation of rural migration to Istanbul in literature, placing Henri Lefebvre’s concept of the right to the city at the centre of the argument. Using a framework of critical urban theory, the book examines Orhan Kemal’s Gurbet Kuşları [The Homesick Birds] (1962); Muzaffer İzgü’s Halo Dayı ve İki Öküz [Uncle Halo and Two Oxen] (1973); Latife Tekin’s Berci Kristin Çöp Masalları [Berji Kristin: Tales From the Garbage Hills] (1984); Metin Kaçan’s Ağır Roman [Heavy Roman(i)] (1990); Ayhan Geçgin’s Kenarda [On the Periphery] (2003); Hatice Meryem’s İnsan Kısım Kısım, Yer Damar Damar [It Takes All Kinds] (2008); and Orhan Pamuk’s Kafamda Bir Tuhaflık [A