Elif Shafak Turkish Novelist, essayist, public speaker, politician, scientist, and activist. Shafak writes in Turkish and English and has published 19 books. She is best known for her novels, which include The Bastard of Istanbul.
.Her works, including The Forty Rules of Love, Three Daughters of Eve, and 10 Minutes and 38 Seconds in This Strange World, have been translated into 55 languages and nominated for various literary awards. She has been described by the Financial Times as “Turkey’s” leading female novelist, with several of her works having been blockbusters in Turkey and transnationally.
Early life:
Elif Shafak Turkish Novelist, she was born in Strasbourg, France, to Nuri Bilgin, a philosopher. .
Shafak Atayman, who later became a diplomat, returned to Ankara, Turkey after her parents died.
She remained raised by her mother and maternal grandmother.
Despite facing challenges growing up in a dysfunctional family, she emphasizes that a non-patriarchal environment had a valuable impact on her upbringing.
In her mid-twenties, having grown up without her father, she met her half-brothers for the first time.
Education:
Elif Shafak turkish Novelist, studied for an undergraduate degree in international relations at Middle East Technical University and received a master’s degree in women’s studies. She holds a PH.D. in political science. In the UK, she held the Weindenfeld visiting professorship in relative European literature at St Anne’s College, University of Oxford, for the 2017-2018 academic year, where she is an honorary fellow.Elif Shafak Turkish Novelist.
Career:
Furthermore, Shafak has published 19 books, spanning both fiction and nonfict.
The Rumi Prize in 1998, a Turkish literary award, honored Shafak’s first novel, Pinhan.
Shafak’s 1999 novel Mehram (The Gaze) was awarded “Best Novel” by the Turkish Authors ’Association .
Shortlisted for the Best Foreign Fiction Award in 2005, Bite Palas, Bite was her next novel.
Shafak released her first novel in English, The Saint of Incipient Insanities, in 2004.
The Orange Prize long-listed her second novel in English, The Bastard in Istanbul.
It spoken the Armenian genocide, which is deprived of by the Turkish government. Shafak was prosecuted in July 2006 on charges of “insulting Turkishness” for discussing the extermination in the novel.
If convicted, she would have faced a maximum prison sentence of three years.
The custodian commented that The Bastard of Istanbul may be the first Turkish novel to address the genocide.
The prosecutor cleared her of these charges in September 2006.
Shafak has collected her non-fiction essays in Turkish into four books: Med-Cezar (2005), Firarperest (2010), Semspare (2012), and Sanma ki Yalnizsin (2017).
. In 2020, Shafak published How to Stay Sane in the Age of Division.
Personal Life:
Having lived in Istanbul and the United States, Shafak moved to the UK.
Despite living in London since 2013, Shafak speaks of “carrying Istanbul in her soul.” However, as of 2019, she had been in self-imposed exile from Turkey due to fear of prosecution.
The Turkish journalist Eyup Can Saglik, a former editor of the newspaper Radikal, is Shafak’s husband. They have a daughter and a son together.
In 2017, Shafak came out as Biseaxual.
After the birth of her daughter in 2006, Shafak suffered from postnatal depression, a period she addressed in her memoir, Black Milk.
Books Names:
The gaze
The saint of incipient insanities.
The bastard of Istanbul
The forty rules of love
Honour
The architect’s apprentice
Three daughters of Eva
10 minutes, 38 seconds in this strange world
The island of missing trees
Books Awards:
Pinhan, the great rumi award, turkey in 1998
The Gaze, a union of Turkish writers’ best novels, won the 2000 Prize.
The Flea Palace, shortlisted for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize, United Kingdom, 2005
The 2012 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award nominated The Forty Rules of Love.
Honour, second place for the Prix Escalade, France 2014.
The architect’s apprentice, shortlisted for the RSL Ondaatje Prize 2015.
10 minutes, 38 seconds in this strange world, shortlisted for the Booker Prize 2019. The Costa Book Award shortlisted The Island of Missing Trees.
Elif Shafak quotes:
I spent my entire childhood observing people.
Books change us.
I love commuting between languages, just like I love commuting between cultures and cities.
Furthermore, “God is the biggest storyteller, and when we create stories, we cannot be with him or with each other across cultural, religious, and gender boundaries.”
””Love cannot be explained, yet it explains all.”
“Stop running after the waves. Let the sea come to you.”
“In art, there is no such thing as them; the other is me.”
“Do not go with the flow. Be the flow.”
The past lives within the present, and…
“We humans have a knock for choosing our own prisons.”
”Embrace the changes that come your way; try not to resist them.
“Language is my homeland.”
“Sometimes the only thing to do was to avoid falling deeper into the abyss.”
”Being scared and being brave constitute a difference.
Continuing from the initial statement, it is essential to recognize that knowledge that extends beyond oneself is far more challenging than embracing ignorance.
“The things that make us different are the things that make us beautiful.”
