Posts filed under 'intercultural influences'

Life Adorned with a Little Death: A Review of Journey to the Edge of Life by Tezer Özlü

This is a novel of simultaneous journeys outward and inward, through space and time, and also through memory and literature. . .

Journey to the Edge of Life by Tezer Özlü, translated from the Turkish by Maureen Freely, Transit Books, 2025

The Turkish writer Tezer Özlü lacks widespread recognition in the Anglosphere, but the tide of her English reception is turning thanks to the efforts of Maureen Freely, the translator of Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk. In her lifetime of 1943-86, Özlü was part of a moment in modern Turkish literary history in which secular women writers proliferated. Though many of them too remain in relative obscurity among English audiences, one can only hope that the publication of Özlü’s novels will set off a domino effect.

In 2022, Deep Vellum released an updated translation (thanks to a joint but asynchronous effort between Nermin Menemencioğlu and Amy Marie Spangler) of Tuhaf Bir Kadın / A Strange Woman by Leylâ Erbil—the only Turkish women to be nominated for the Nobel as well as Özlü’s friend, source of influence, and dedicated epistolary correspondent. Originally published in 1971, Tuhaf Bir Kadın is a pioneering force in the genre of Turkish women’s writing, but proved to be a controversial text for its frank exploration of a woman’s sexuality, representation of domestic abuse, and explicit engagement with the political left. Still, it set the stage for a new generation of authors, and its legacy extends into the twenty-first century with novelists like Elif Shafak, who is committed to exposing the deep-rooted misogynistic violence of Turkish patriarchal society. For instance, her 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World narrates the story of a murdered prostitute in Istanbul; the dead woman’s brain continues to function for the length of time in the title, a dirge for the disposability and precarity of women’s lives in the Turkish metropolis. READ MORE…

Weekly Dispatches from the Front Lines of World Literature

Literature seeks to rectify, repair, and pave new ground in this week's dispatches.

As James Baldwin said; “It was books that taught me that the things that tormented me most were the very things that connected me with all the people who were alive, or who had ever been alive.” This week, our editors are reaffirming the ability of literature to overcome discrimination and unite people with a shared passion through words. In Madrid, the Woolf Pack open mic night has been celebrating womxn and LGBTQI+ writers, whilst in the Czech Republic, a workshop sparked lively discussion on modern Tibetan literature. Read on to find out more!

Paloma Reaño Hurtado, Editor-at-Large, reporting from Madrid

The Woolf Pack is an open mic night celebrated since September 2018 at Desperate Literature, a trilingual bookstore in the centre of Madrid. Everyone is invited to attend, but the mic is exclusively open to womxn (cis and trans) and LGBTQI+ identifying folk. The event echoes a similar initiative called Self-Ish, launched in Paris for the first time in May 2016.

Aiming to be a tribute to the womxn and queer writers who have overcome all kinds of obstacles to make their literature, The Woolf Pack is a homage to womxn and LGBT idols from different times and latitudes—hence the name of the event. It is, in sum, a sort of anti-macho literature night; each participant can share their own or any other author’s text, as long as it is another female/trans/nonbinary author. READ MORE…