Religion and values ​​in Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar: An analysis of the author's novels

The subject of this study is the perceptions of religion and values in Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar's novels. Tanpınar lived in the period when the Republic was proclaimed, a new political administration was established and a new socio-cultural order was being established (1901-1962). In this respect, his novels show the characteristics of the period in question and trace the changing human being. The individual, formed by a society shrouded in traditional religious understanding and values, evolves into modernity with changing conditions and develops different types of religious perceptions, types of religiosity and forms of religious life. In addition, the values that the individual inherits from his/her culture and tradition also undergo some transformations under the influence of changing conditions. From this point of view, the aim of the study is to reveal the changing understanding of religion and values of the people of Tanpınar's time and himself, and the transforming views of religiosity. In this qualitative study, descriptive analysis technique was used. After a literature review and reading the main sources directly related to the study, passages with similar topics and content were brought together and classified under common headings. As a result of this classification and the subsequent descriptive analysis, it has been determined that a critical change and transformation took place in the context of religion and values during Tanpınar's lifetime. It has been observed that this change does not occur sharply, but gradually and manifests itself at different rates and in different ways for each individual. As a result, it has been determined that Tanpınar and the individuals around him developed new and modern perspectives in terms of religion and values during his lifetime, yet they could not break away from their traditional perceptions of religion and some of the values they brought from the past. Keywords: Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar, Religion, Value, Change, Psychology.