Historical novels in Republic Period between 1923-1946: New discourse of "old" heroes

This thesis focuses on the quantitative and qualitative analysis of historical novels written between 1923-1946, i.e. from the foundation of the Republic until the start of the multi-party period. The common belief about the novels of the period is that these fictive pieces are written under the heavy influence of the so-called "Turkish History Thesis" which emphasizes a Turkish history rooted in Central Asia. However this study shows that most of the time the Ottoman Empire constitutes the subject of these historical novels. Furthermore, the allegedly "historical" heroes of these novels represent the intellectual foundation and mentality of the early Republic period. If this is the case, how can we claim that these heroes are "historical?" The analysis undertaken in this dissertation demonstrates that the authors of historical novels in the Republic era aimed at creating a perfect hero and considered the protagonists of the novels as a means to this end. The protagonists were fashioned as passive tools of the nation-state and awareness-building process. As a result, these allegedly "historical" heroes constitute a discourse heavily loaded with the ideological and political terms of the 19th and 20th century. In addition, the bibliographical studies on historical novels are inadequate and factually erroneous, thus suggesting that literary studies dealing with historical novels between 1923-1946 are problematic; rather, both are in line with the dominant ideology of the era, Turkism. As the dates of print of some historical novels by M. Turhan Tan, Nizamettin Nazif Tepedelenlioğlu, Enver Behnan Şapolyo, İskender Fahrettin Sertelli, Ziya Şakir Soku and Apdullah Ziya Kozanoğlu are provided in this study for the first time, it can be claimed that the generalizations of literary studies concerning the historical novels of the era are not valid. In addition, the claim put forth by these studies that historical novels were popular between 1926-1943 does not appear to be realistic when data regarding the publication of historical novels from the printing sector are taken under consideration. Keywords: Historical Novels of Republic Era, Passivity of Hero, Nizamettin Nazif Tepedelenlioğlu, M. Turhan Tan, Ziya Şakir Soku, İskender Fahrettin Sertelli, Apdullah Ziya Kozanoğlu, Enver Behnan Şapolyo.