Walking in Sait Faik's short stories

ABSTRACT Sait Faik Abasıyanık became the pioneer of an innovative voice in Turkish storytelling by focusing his work on prose. Centering his works on the ordinary person and love for humanity, the author elevates the loneliness of the urban individual to an aesthetic dimension through the concept of vagrancy. The family fragmentation in his childhood transformed him into a searching character who could not belong to a fixed place. In this context, the motif of "walking" in the author's stories is analyzed as a multi-layered narrative element. Walking is a form of thinking, producing, escaping, and existential searching. Sait Faik's constant movement in Istanbul streets, shores, and island life is the starting point of this study. The author made walking a method of getting to know people, observing the city, and constructing stories. His traveler identity, which approaches the flaneur attitude, makes the ordinary person, small happinesses, and social loneliness visible. In the study, the contribution of walking to intellectual production in world and Turkish literature is evaluated through figures like Rousseau, Nietzsche, Ahmet Haşim, and Tanpınar. When the motif of walking in Sait Faik's stories is examined, it is seen that this action is presented alongside loneliness. The characters' walks reflect feelings of non-belonging, rootlessness, and inner confinement. While walks with imaginary friends make loneliness visible, walks associated with illness bring physical decline and spiritual breakdown together. Animals appear as companions and shelters in modern life. Additionally, walking offers an escape from social pressures but rarely solves problems. In conclusion, the verbs "to walk", "to run", "to stop", and "to watch" determine the characters' moods, their relationship with life, and the rhythm of the narrative. Walking is at the center of thinking, isolation, escape, observation, and creation. Keywords: Walking, Sait Faik Abasıyanık, Short Story, Loneliness, City, Flâneur, Creativity