| Elif Şafak | |
|---|---|
| Born | 25 October 1971 Strasbourg, France |
| Occupation | Novelist |
| Period | 1994 – present |
| Literary movement | Postmodern literature |
| Notable work(s) | The Gaze The Bastard of Istanbul The Forty Rules of Love: A Novel of Rumi |
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www.elifshafak.com |
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Elif Şafak (sometimes spelled Elif Shafak), (born 1971, Strasbourg, France) is a Turkish writer who writes in both Turkish and English. Her books have been translated into more than thirty languages.
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Shafak has published twelve books, seven of which are novels. She writes in both Turkish and English. Her most recent novel, written in English, The Forty Rules of Love, was published in the U.S. in February 2010 and in the UK by Penguin Books in June 2010. Selling more than 550,000 copies it became a record best-seller in Turkey. Shafak is also a best-selling author in Italy, France and Bulgaria.
Shafak's first novel, Pinhan (The Mystic) was awarded the Rumi Prize in 1998, which is given to the best work in mystical literature in Turkey. Her second novel, Şehrin Aynaları (Mirrors of the City), brings together Jewish and Islamic mysticism against a historical setting in the 17th century Mediterranean. Şhafak's novel Mahrem (The Gaze), earned her the Union of Turkish Writers' Prize in 2000. Her next novel, Bit Palas (The Flea Palace), was a bestseller in Turkey. The book was followed by Med-Cezir, a non-fiction book of essays on gender, sexuality, mental ghettoes, and literature.
Shafak's first novel to be written in English, The Saint of Incipient Insanities, was published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in 2004. Her second novel in English, The Bastard of Istanbul, was the bestselling book of 2006 in Turkey. The novel resulted in charges being brought against Shafak for "insulting Turkishness" under Article 301, but the charges were subsequently dismissed.[1][2][3]
In July 2010 Shafak gave a speech at TED Oxford on “The Politics of Fiction”. She talked about the role of literature in helping leap over cultural walls and embrace different experiences and argued that fiction can overcome the limits of identity politics. She said, “knowledge that does not take us beyond is far worse than ignorance.”[4]
Her forthcoming novel is set in London in the 1960s and 70s and concerns the experiences of an immigrant family.
Shafak was born Elif Bilgin in Strasbourg to philosopher Nuri Bilgin and Şafak Atayman who later became a diplomat. When she was a year old her parents separated and Shafak was raised by a single mother.[5] She said that not growing up in a typical patriarchal family had a great impact on her work and writing.[4] She incorporated her mother's first name, which means Dawn, with her own when constructing her pen name.
Shafak spent her teenage years in Madrid and Philadelphia before returning to Turkey. She has also lived in Boston, Michigan, Arizona, Istanbul and London.
Istanbul has always been a central part of Shafak’s writing. According to Shafak, "In Istanbul, you understand, perhaps not intellectually but intuitively, that East and West are ultimately imaginary ideas, ones that can be de-imagined and re-imagined."[6] In the same essay written for Time Magazine Shafak says "East and West is no water and oil. They do mix. And in a city like Istanbul they mix intensely, incessantly, amazingly."[6]
In a piece she wrote for the BBC, she said, “Istanbul is like a huge, colourful Matrushka - you open it and find another doll inside. You open that, only to see a new doll nesting. It is a hall of mirrors where nothing is quite what it seems. One should be cautious when using categories to talk about Istanbul. If there is one thing the city doesn't like, it is clichés."[7]
In 2005, Shafak married Turkish journalist Eyüp Can and has two children. She named her daughter after Zelda Fitzgerald and her son after a story by Borges, The Zahir.
Shafak first became interested in Sufism as a college student in her early 20s. In The Forty Rules of Love, she tackles the subject with a modern love story between a Jewish-American housewife and a modern Sufi living in Amsterdam. She said in an interview given to the Guardian, "The more you read about Sufism, the more you have to listen. In time I became emotionally attached. When I was younger I wasn't interested in understanding the world. I only wanted to change it, through feminism or nihilism or environmentalism. But the more I read about Sufism the more I unlearned. Because that is what Sufism does to you, it makes you erase what you know, what you are so sure of. And then start thinking again. Not with your mind this time, but with your heart."[8]
Shafak grew up with two very different models of Turkish motherhood – her modern, working, educated mother and her traditional, religious grandmother.
Her novel, The Forty Rules of Love is concerned with questions of motherhood and selfhood. Ella Rubenstein, the middle-aged American housewife and mother at the heart of the novel, is unhappily married to an unfaithful and neglectful husband, and in thrall to the needs of her children. Her own life and needs and aspirations have been lost along the way, as has her belief in love.
Shafak is a political scientist, having graduated from the program in International Relations at Middle East Technical University in Turkey. She holds a Masters degree in Gender and Women’s Studies and a Ph.D. in political science from the same university. Her master’s thesis on Islam, women, and mysticism received an award from the Social Scientists Institute.
Shafak continues to write for various daily and monthly publications in Turkey. She has also contributed to various papers, including The Guardian, Le Monde, Berliner Zeitung, Dutch Handelsbladt, The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and Time (Magazine), and has been featured in the U.S. on National Public Radio.