VENICE IN THE NOVELS OF NEDIM GÜRSEL AND METIN ARDITI

Abstract

As a narrative space Venice has inspired a great number of novelists and poets. Nedim Gürsel’snovel Les Turbans de Venise and Metin Arditi’s novel le Turquetto take place in the lagoon city.The protagonist of Nedim Gürsel, Kâmil Uzman is a professor of art history, a specialist of theVenetian painting of Renaissance and Metin Arditi protagonist is a very famous painter of VenetianRenaissance, a disciple of Titian. Venice, its canals and small streets have a very concrete presencein both novels which contain similar themes. The themes are: love and death, painting, the carnival,exile and the “elsewhere”. Some of these themes are part of the myth of Venice. It is possible tosay that they are specific and unique to Venice. The city of doges remains distant and closed to bothprotagonists who are alone in life. Istanbul is seen in both novels as a geographical “elsewhere”opposed to Venice.