Prosser, J orcid.org/0000-0002-9327-9631 (2019) The invisible dome and the unbuilt bridge: Contemporary fiction and the mythologies of Ottoman architecture. Memory Studies, 12 (5). pp. 514-530. ISSN 1750-6980
Abstract
This essay investigates the representation of sixteenth-century architecture during the Ottoman Empire in Elif Shafak’s The Architect’s Apprentice (2014) and Mathias Enard’s Tell Them of Battles, Kings and Elephants (2018). Working with Walter Benjamin’s concept of architecture as testimony to mythology, the essay classifies the novels as architecture-ologies which demythologise empire at a moment of literal construction. The essay argues that, via the symbols of dome and bridge, the novels intervene in contemporary Ottoman nostalgia, both by treating architecture as memorialising transcultural exchange, and by reconstructing memories of transcultural violence founding the architecture and the Ottoman Empire. Building on the dialogue between literature and architecture, particularly Henry James’ ‘house of fiction’, the essay reveals how the novels’ ekphrases – their trans-mediation of dome and bridge into different forms of historical fiction – put into narrative perspective the imperial conquests and transcultural violence supporting the architecture of Sinan and Michelangelo.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © The Author(s) 2019. This is an author produced version of a paper published in Memory Studies. Reprinted by permission of SAGE Publications. |
Keywords: | Enard; historical fiction; Shafak; transcultural memory |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Cultures (Leeds) > School of English (Leeds) |
Funding Information: | Funder Grant number Arts & Humanities Research Council AHRC AH/K000403/1 |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 29 Jul 2019 08:58 |
Last Modified: | 13 Nov 2019 16:44 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Sage Publications |
Identification Number: | 10.1177/1750698019870693 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:149068 |