A Turkish-British award-winning novelist who holds the distinction of being the most widely read female writer in Turkey contends that in a divided world seething with anger, novelists can no longer afford to be apolitical in the exercise of their craft.
Elif Shafak, a women’s rights activist and public speaker who has published 13 books including 10 novels, shared her outspoken views on writing in her New Statesman/Goldsmiths Prize lecture on September 26, 2018 at the University of London in the UK. Shafak is one of the judges for the 2018 Goldsmiths Prize, which celebrates the qualities of creative daring by rewarding fiction that breaks the mold or extends the possibilities of the novel form.
“The world is frighteningly messy today, but a world that has lost its empathy, cognitive flexibility and imagination will surely be a darker place,” Shafak explains. “The novel matters because it connects us with the experiences of people we have never met, times we have never seen, places we have never visited. The novel matters not only because of the stories it brings alive, but also the silences it dares to explore. As novelists we keep our ears pricked all the time, attentive to the rhythm of the language, the usage of words, the stories and legends swirling in the air – but we must also listen carefully to the silences. Here we find the things that cannot be openly talked about in a society; the political, cultural, sexual taboos.”
Currently a Weidenfeld visiting professor at Oxford University, St Anne's College, Shafak describes her personal philosophy as a novelist in this wise: “A writer’s job is not to try to provide the answers. It is neither to preach nor to teach; just the opposite. A writer must be a student of life, and not the best student either, since we must never graduate from this school, but keep asking the most simple, the most fundamental and the most difficult questions. In the end, we leave the answers to the readers.”
Read Elif Shafak’s “Why the novel matters in the age of anger” in the October 3, 2018 issue of NewStatesman.com now!ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Elif Shafak is an award-winning novelist, political commentator, and inspirational public speaker who writes in both Turkish and English. She has published 15 books, 10 of them novels (among them
The Bastard of Istanbul,
The Forty Rules of Love, and
Three Daughters of Eve); her books have been translated into more than 40 languages. A TED Global speaker and founding member of the European Council on Foreign Relations, she was awarded the title of Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres in 2010.
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Check out this related 2011 posting in the Forum, “The role of religion in the ruthless discrimination against women.”
