Suicide in the Turkish and British novels (After the second World War)

The suicide is a protest against life for the individual who has the ability of leading a self-determined life. Literature can provide us with the resonation of that crying. The suicide has become more common in the Turkish and English novels written especially after World War II. The works which harbour suicidal characters have traces of conflict of values psychologically or sociologically. To that end, 12 Turkish novels -Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar's Huzur, Hüseyin Nihal Atsız's Ruh Adam(1972), Yusuf Atılgan's Anayurt Oteli (1973), Adalet Ağaoğlu's Ölmeye Yatmak(1973), Aysel Özakın's Genç Kız ve Ölüm (1980), Tezer Özlü's Yaşamın Ucuna Yolculuk(1984), Mehmet Eroğlu's Geç Kalmış Ölü (1984), Buket Uzuner's İki Yeşil Susamuru(1991), Kaan Arslanoğlu's İntihar Zamanımızın Bir Kahramanı(1999), İnci Aral's Yeşil(1994) and Mor(2003) and Leyla Erbil's Üç Başlı Ejderha(2005) - and 12 English novels- (Graham Greene'sThe Heart of the Matter(1948) Muriel Spark'sThe Driver's Seat (1970), Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar (1963), Iris Murdoch'sThe Black Prince (1973), Lawrence Durrell's Monsieur or The Prince of Darkness (1974), William Golding'sThe Rites of Passage (1980), Martin Amis's Money A Suicide Note (1984), Ian McEwan'sThe Child in Time(1987), Michael Cunningham'sThe Hours (1998), Nick Hornby's A Long Way Down (2005), Anne Enright's The Gathering (2007) and Julian Barnes'in The Sense of an Ending(2011)- are analysed in our study. The aim of this thesis is to compare and contrast the similarities and differences betwen the suicidal behaviours of the characters with respect to their reasons, methods and places and to reveal the attitude of both Turkish and English culture towards suicide. Key Words: suicide, Turkish, English, culture, comparative literature