A Romantic Vienna Siege or the Approach of Adalet Ağaoğlu to Ottoman History


Beginning from the Tanzimat Period, history which has taken place in novels, has undergone a number of changes when the developments in world literature and the changes in social and political fields after 1990 have started to be involved in our literature with the changing perception of authors in Turkish novels. Foremost among those changes is renouncing the understanding of “national identity” which is desired to be formed by using history as a tool. Postmodern authors who use the history as a background have digressed from the “national” idea that was seen in the historical novels of the first periods. That was caused by the facility of The New Historicist understanding which features the social and cultural life through the fictional characters that didn’t even take place in formal history before. Postmodern authors approach to the facts within the context of “reality” instead of “real”. “History”, which has lost the facility of being real, has been turned into a part of postmodern “game” fictionalized in novels and the aim is to make the reader be accustomed to the atmosphere of reality that is formed. Accordingly in “Romantik/ Bir Viyana Yazı” Adalet Ağaoğlu forms the inner world of the person around the history theme with the postmodern understanding that is mentioned. The history which is dealt as part of History teacher Kamil Kaya’s lessons becomes the part of a game that is connected to the private life of Kâmil Kaya. Adalet Ağaoğlu features the “baroque” mentality of Kâmil Kaya who is known as “dreamy teacher” by his students. Therefore Kâmil Kaya desires to see his dream city Vienna. Adalet Ağaoğlu wants to rewrite the history by finding out new arguments from Ottoman history through that emotional connection between Kâmil Kaya and Vienna.


Keywords


Adalet Ağaoğlu, Romantik/Bir Viyana Yazı, postmodern historical novel, the new historicism.

Author : Samet KARA
Number of pages: 597-610
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.29228/TurkishStudies.22922
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Turkish Studies - Language and Literature
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