Magical realism in Turkish novel after 1980

One of the prominent literary styles of contemporary literature, magical realism creates its narratives by synthesizing ordinary with supernatural. The concept, which began to provide examples in the novel genre in the second half of the 20th century, found its current identity in the field of literature after maturing in areas such as philosophy, painting, and politics in Europe, influenced by the Surrealist movement. Magical realism, most famously has been exemplified in Latin American literature, also started to be produced works in Turkish literature in the last quarter of the century. Although magical realism is a new concept, it has existed as an ancient storytelling tradition in traditional societies for many years. Stemming from the collective consciousness codes of societies, it has been reflected in numerous literary works from the oral tradition to the written tradition before the Age of Enlightenment. Although it lost its power in the years when rationality led and scientific knowledge was accepted as the only reliable source, after Modernism which head for a fall for its own end with the dilemmas it created, magiacal realism regained popularity in the postmodern period through alternative narrative quests. The aim of this study is to determine the theoretical framework of magical realism and identify its development both in Türkiye and in the rest of world, as well as to examine how it manifests itself in the Turkish novel. Accordingly, in the first section, the content and technical characteristics of this tendency are determined, emphasizing its development and dissemination worldwide and highlighting its differences from related genres and movements. In the second section, the motifs that constitute the magical realism narrative in Turkish novels after 1980 are examined using content analysis method, and an attempt is made to determine how the interaction between the ordinary and the supernatural takes place. In conclusion, it is observed that the evaluated works, in general, resort to the supernatural to make the social problems more visible and/or to solve these problems.