Künstlerroman in Turkısh Lıterature and an Orıgınal Work of The Genre: Nahid Sırrı's Novel “Yıldız Olmak Kolay Mı?”

Abstract

The künstlerroman, which can be defined as a narrative form that deals with the problematic existence of the artistic subject and the journey of the artist's pursuit to direct the process of artistic development, is a genre shaped within the circle of German literature, but over time it has begun to find representation in the literary traditions of different nations. The transition of the Künstlerroman genre into con-temporary Turkish literature coincides with its first represenative in the West, about a century later. Nahid Sırrı Örik's novel Yıldız Olmak Kolay mı? (Is it Easy to be a Star?), published in 1944, represents an unique precedent that breaks the monotony of the works written in the genre of künstlerroman in the history of Turk-ish literature. The novel, which deals with the story of a young woman who take a step into to life as a vocal artist, with its unique thematic structure and figurative characters, eliminates the dominance of masculine discourse over the texts of the künstlerroman. In this study, the structural transformations of the künstlerroman during the adaptation into the Turkish literature will be reviewed around the novel Yıldız Olmak Kolay mı?; the similarities and differences between the local works of the genre and its representation in the Western literature will be examined within the framework of the aforementioned work.