Yakup Kadri Karaosmanoğlu'nun romanlarında cinsellik

Abstract

Yakup Kadri Karaosmanoğlu (1889-1974), best known by his novels published in the Republican era, started his career as an author in different genres of literature in the years following the Second Constitutional period. In the history of Turkish literature, it is widely accepted that Yakup Kadri Karaosmanoğlu’s literary works that belong to his early years are in accordance with the idea of “art for art’s sake” and that those published in the Republican period reflect a socially-oriented view of art. Yakup Kadri Karaosmanoğlu, whose first novel is published in 1921, has turned out to be one of the most important figures of the Turkish intellectual history of the Republican era not only with his literary personality but also with his active participation in its politics. He is perceived as one of the initiators of the “Canon of National Literature”, especially in relation to his novels. Therefore, his works have become a subject of widespread research, constituting an area of its kind, namely the “Yakup Kadri Readings”. In this work, an alternative reading practice is developed in order to replace the current readings that focus on ideology, history, and politics. The study investigates how Yakup Kadri dealt with the issue of “sexual identity” in his novels, which has not been analyzed so far. Thus, an approach that is based on close reading, character analysis and psychoanalytic theory is carried throughout the study. In order to examine the problematic place of sexuality in the works of Yakup Kadri, three novels of the author, namely Hüküm Gecesi (1927), Yaban (1932) and Bir Sürgün (1937), are chosen for in depth analysis.