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The Center for Middle Eastern Studies presents
Selen Erdoğan, Associate of the Center for Middle Eastern Studies
In this talk, Selen Erdoğan will discuss Bilge Karasu’s literary contributions to queer thought. Karasu is one of the most prominent writers of the Turkish language whose works disrupt the heterosexual matrix through forms of narration and constitute literary takes on critical concepts of queer theory. Centering on his first published book, "Death in Troy", the talk will examine how childhood trauma, normative violence, and "doymamışlık" (the state of being ungratified) as an affective burden guide his writing. The talk proposes to read the text as a queer modernist novel by tending to the contradictory entanglement of pleasure with feeling unfulfilled, playfulness with violence, and reparation with trauma. Karasu alludes to an "ayrı dil" (a distinct language) spoken by those cast aside by the heterosexual and conjugal order of modern society. From the margins of this conjugal order, the talk argues, Karasu builds a queer modernist style.
Contact: Liz Flanagan