Halide Edib and the Indian Facets of the Orient

Abstract

Halide Edib Adıvar (1884-1964) is one of the first international writers of modern Turkish literature. This article centers on her notable journey to India in 1935, where she was invited as an international Muslim author and political figure. This study closely examines her resultant literary works, namely "Inside India" and "Conflict of East and West in Turkey." The article delves into the arguable theses she put forth during her "Indian expedition" in response to the tumultuous circumstances of the 1930s political landscape, just preceding the outbreak of World War II. Despite Halide Edib's commendable intellectual endeavors to overcome imperialist nationalism, the argument posited here asserts that her synthesis proposals, grounded in essentialist binary dichotomies, remained entangled within Eurocentric intellectual paradigms and an Orientalist thought style influenced by her own historicity. Within this context, this article points to the similarities between the essential differences that she perceived between the "East" and "West" and the epistemological distinctions she claimed between Hindus and Indian Muslims.