Turkey In Eilf Shafak's "Three Daughters of Eve" By: Bayan M. AL-Momani
Nazperi Nalbantoglu- Peri the heroine of Elif Shafak's "Three daughters of Eve," rings a bell in some aspects to Fanny Price Jane Austin's "Mansfield Park", yet this paper is not about the differences between the two characters, it is about Peri in specific and fanny will help to shed some light despite the differences in time, place and events. Fanny Price and Peri are two different poles. Three Daughters of Eve is about bringing rivals together, those with totally different perspective of each other. So, why not use some help from a rival strong woman writer, Jane Austin, those two writers of two different places know how to make a stand and leave their mark. Nazperi or Peri is presented at the beginning of "Three daughters of Eve" as a grown-up who "Time, like any skillful tailor, had seamlessly stitched together the two fabrics that sheathed Peri's life: what people thought of her and what she thought of herself." Fanny Price, is a little girl "Afraid of everybody, ashamed of herself, and longing for the home she had left, she know not how to look up, and could scarcely speak to be heard, or without crying." Is there any resemblance between the two? Well, as a reader when you read any book you will say I read this somewhere and you as an observer, will come up with your own view, judgement and like time stitch what you read to what you know. Peri learned to listen and account for every single sound. She as a little girl could feel the wall between Selma and Mansur, her mother and father, rising higher every passing year, and that has formed and shaped her personality. She never questioned her parents' relationship; she just observed and filled her mind with questions because she thought she had the answers and that turned her into indecisive reluctant and simply lost person. Peri was more like the "Mute Poet" the name of the street she lived in when she was little, the poet was a "renowned Ottoman poet who resided in the area, swore not to open his mouth again until he was suitably rewarded by the sultan." Peri's main dilemma is religion, she is torn between her mother and father, her father is devoted to Ataturk "if it weren't for him, we'd be like Iran." Peri's house is a mirror to see Turkey in it, what Turkey had gone through and what it is dealing with at the present time. Selma, her mother, had joined a religious circle led by a preacher famous for the eloquence of his sermons and the rigidity of his views. Her mother changed visibly. Turkey is divided into zones "the realm of submission and the 1
realm of war," her mother and father symbolizes these zones. Selma's attempts to argue her views and beliefs fiercely with the opposite part of the house tore the family into two halves. One of Peri's brothers, Hakan, became religious and nationalistic and Umut her second brother became a leftist. Peri was left in the middle trying to keep her neutrality, but deep inside her mind was all the time fighting this awkward situation. She became like the "Mute Poet." "In one particular corner of the living room, there were two shelves above the TV stand; the first was reserved for her father's books_ Ataturk: The Rebirth of a Nation by Lord Kinross… and old edition of The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. The second was a different world altogether, Hadiths compiled by al-Bukhari; Disciplining the soul by al-Ghazali;" and so on. Despite the fact that Peri watched them fight and hurt each other badly, her parents survived and obviously bore each other under the same roof all these years and that is democracy by itself. They simply accepted the existence of each party. As readers of "Three daughters of Eve" or observers of what Turkey is going through, emerges a question, does materialism ban the existence of religion, or any religion? If so, why it is not the case in other parts of the world? The president of the United States of America is elected mainly because of his credentials that qualify him to be a president. A view stated by the historian George Bancroft in the early nineteenth century: "The constitution establishes nothing that interferes with equality and individuality. It knows nothing of differences by descent, or opinions of favored classes, or legalized religion, or the political power of property… the institutions and laws of the country rise out of the masses of individual thought which, like the waters of the ocean, are rolling ever more." A People's History of The United States, 1492-present, Howard Zinn. But the recent elections showed that religion is a factor and a strong one in the United States. Ted Cruz one of the candidates stated that he was "a Christian, then American", Newsweek online, in an attempt to win. In the case of Turkey, I am what? Then I am a Turk. Or the other way round I am a Turk, then I am…?. Each country needs its identity and religion is part of it. Peri is still observing and still mute of her thoughts, mute of her personality and above all mute of the questions banging in her head of the perpetual fight between her mother and father, the two rivals in Turkey. She saw the two of them castling in their corners, walls are getting higher and higher and Peri is just afraid to make a stand. A little help from Jane Austen, "there must be a little imagination here. Depend on it, you see but half. You see the evil, but you don’t see the consolation. There will be a little rubs and disappointments everywhere, and we are all apt to expect too much; but then, if the first calculation is wrong, we make a second better: we find comfort somewhere, and those evil-minded observers who make much of a little, are more taken in and deceived than the parties 2
themselves," Mansfield Park. They are wise words that sum human relations in every aspect of their lives, even political relations. Mensur and Selma with their existence under the same roof and their attitudes towards each other are extremisms by all means. Peri was more like Fanny Price, "she was safe; but peace and safety were unconnected here. Her mind had been farther from peace. She couldn’t feel that she had done wrong herself, but she was disquieted in every other way." Mensur says, "Education will save us! It's the only way forward." "Work hard, save yourself from ignorance." Then he gives a remark about God, "he'd better be real… I'll ask Him where He's been all this time. He's left us to our own devices for too long!" Mensur was precise and inadvertent in presenting Turkey's dilemma, in fact it is a worldwide issue. Education and ignorance, education is the right path and all religions present it as the light at the end of the tunnel. Education should enlighten people's perception of their own religion and God. With all the evil in the world these days it is clear that education can never be a savior unless one understands and truly apprehends what he is getting from his education, and then how he uses it. Moving forward doesn’t mean being a passionate believer or non-believer, it is how to bring those remote pieces together and never remain stuck in between, like Peri the mute poet. Things for her were doubt more than belief, erasing more than writing and her unanswered eternal question, does modernism mean secularism? "I know no harm of Charles Maddox: but the excessive intimacy which must spring from his being admitted among us in this manner is highly objectionable, the more than intimacy, the familiarity. I cannot think of it with any patience; and it does appear to me an evil of such magnitude as must, if possible, be prevented. Do you not see it in the same light?" Jane Austen, Mansfield Park. Peri's social relationships were just the same. She found shelter in books, her true friends. She developed her learning methods and kept asking for more. She went to the west, England, the outside world, outside Turkey to be clearer. But peri the mute poet considered it her father dream and she is about to make his dream come true, his dream was that Peri will be "educated, idealistic, forwardthinking graduate who would rescue this country from its backwardness." So inconsistent Peri gets to Oxford University, one of the world's best places for the best education, and it is until now about fulfilling her father's dream. There she meets the new version of Mensur and Salma, Shirin and Muna. As Elif Shafak puts it "they were the most unlikely friends, the sinner, the believer and the confused. Of course Peri is the confused, the doubter, the Mute Poet so how can she move forward. Peri didn’t know that by her ways of listening and observing of what she went through and going through, she became that piece of magnet with its opposite poles. Now she encounters a new phase of her life, watching the two poles fight each other by arguing rather than tearing each other into pieces. It is when Muna and Shirin accept to be under the same roof willingly 3
despite knowing in advance that they will never get along. Now that is a perfect way to move forward. So Peri observers and learns but never really puts it into practice. Since her entire life was built on doubt when it comes to God, which was her continuing dilemma, here at Oxford University with Shirin and Salma or back home with Mensur and Salma, she attends seminars on God. As readers observing events, the idea of going to these seminars is her destiny leading her to make a stand later on, her road to salvation. Passive Peri, our Mute Poet gets into trouble with her Professor and she simply refuses to open her mouth and utter the words that will make her visible and as things get worse she gets back home and live a life that was all the time attached to the strings of the hanging past. She didn’t feel so, until there comes a day that she was forced to defend herself and claim something taken from her which ironically resembled her unfinished past. That day was her salvation day, because afterwards events accelerated and her mute observation of things and people was different. After the first incident she goes to a party and she meets some friends and other people she didn’t know. All of them were from the two poles, and Peri now could see what is beneath their masks, as a reader you can sense her disapproval, resentment, feeling uneasy with this fake place and the veils on their faces. She couldn’t keep playing her game of make belief. All of them resent each other but will not say a word, they are also playing the same game. The time comes for the final curtain for the mute poet, time to see true education and this long time of keeping silent and observing combine together to make a stand. Another incident, a serious one happens during the event she is attending and she hides in small room, the same size of room she was putting herself in all these years, time to wake up. She picks the phone and calls her English Professor who tells her that all the time he that she had three things she never knew of herself, "the longing for love, the search for knowledge and the unbearable compassion for the suffering of mankind." Then, surprisingly Peri utters what shows clearly her knowledge and understanding of her heritage mingling with her education. She says," Ibn Rushd was an eminent philosopher, Ibn Arabi a young and hopeful student and when they met for the first time, they felt a rapport as they were both devoted to books and learning and neither embraced the orthodoxy. Still they were different. The same question about the East and the West, how do you increase your knowledge of the world and yourself? Ibn Rushd answer was through reflective thinking, Reasoning, Studying. Ibn Arabi wanted both reason and mystical insights. Before they went their separate ways, Ibn Rushd asked Ibn Arabi, Is it through rational consideration that we unveil the truth? Ibn Arabi said, "Between the yes and no," "spirits fly from their matter and minds from their bodies." And why Peri is interested in the story because she says," I was always in 4
that limbo between yes and no. no stranger to faith no stranger to doubt, undecided, vacillating. Never self-confident. Maybe it made me who I am, all that uncertainty. It also became my worst enemy." To Peri what was great about the Professor is that he was open to the new. As she keep on talking her voice gets stronger. As a reader I felt one thing about Peri, the new Peri is that whether the police arrived on time or not, she is going to open the door and leave the room. The small room that she kept her inner self all this time is now locked. She is not the Mute Poet anymore, she now understands how to address the two rival poles in her country, to appreciate her own heritage and fulfill her father's dream by using her education to become "idealistic, forward-thinking." Extremism in neglecting and alienating each other is not the answer; it is through arguing whatever staunch each side is going to be. In the end they all live under the same roof. Three Daughters of Eve is a notebook of what Turkey went to, and is going through nowadays personified through Peri.
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