Depolarizing the Polarized: Elif Shafakʼs Three Daughters of Eve and Turkey

Abstract

The modern Republic of Turkey has been plagued with political, cultural, and religious polarization due in large part to the antithetical interpretations of modernization by different regimes in the history of the country. In recent years, it has been exacerbated by the ascendancy of the religious right, particularly after the attempted coup in 2016, which has created a volatile situation that is almost insoluble. Elif Shafak’s Three Daughters of Eve presents a rich portrait of the people of Turkey, the Middle East and on a wider scale the world who are variously represented as, and pushed to be, secular, conservative, nationalist, and religious, from the perspective of an irresolute woman character. Zooming in on the Turkish historical and social context, this paper argues that Shafak’s treatment of polarization also offers an insight into the possibility of depolarization and social unification despite existing challenges. As I shall attempt to demonstrate, Shafak achieves this purpose by using a kind of ecumenical language and applying a strategy in which past and present, and opposite poles are agglomerated in a particular style that we can situate within the multiple modernities approaches.