Pamuk's The New Life is a wonderful novel. The book has a lot to say about the cultural issues affecting the Muslim world, specifically Turkey. The subject of the novel, however, the attempt to discover the meaning of life in a world that provides no easy answers, is universal. It provides an excellent read whether the reader is Muslim, Christian, Jew, etc.--he or she just needs to be human.
The plot begins with an engineering student, "a dreamy kid with nothing special to recommend him," who comes across a book which fascinates him so much he resolves to change his life. He reads it over and over, determined to begin a new life with the book as his guide.
Many others, we soon learn, have read the same words and have become similarly inspired--that is, obsessed. Just about all of them are young men. By this time the reader realizes that the book, the exact contents of which are never disclosed, is a latter-day Koran, transforming those who are susceptible to its message into devoted believers.
One of Pamuk's main themes, most prominent in his novel, Snow, is that modernism isn't working in the Muslim world, and its failure is causing a rise of fundamentalist religious views. The author's view--and I agree with him--is that secular Turkey has failed to make the necessary reforms to make life less burdensome for the masses. They try to compensate broken promises of this world with imaginary promises of the next, with predictable results.
The protagonist is, however, somewhat different. The angel in his case who "reveals," that is, provides him with the book, is not Gabriel but a beautiful young woman named Janan, a name which translates as "the Beloved." His journey is more erotic rather than religious. There is a love triangle here: Janan is in love with Mehmet, a fellow student who has disappeared. The jealous protagonist eventually decides to track him down and kill him, and eventually succeeds. (Sexual desire plays a central role in Pamuk's work; this is perhaps why the protagonist has the same initials as the author, and refers to himself at one point as "Orphan Panic.")
Pamuk is as ironic as he is subtle. The author of the New Life book is O.P's Uncle Rifki, the creator of popular children's books. The modern Koran, his final work--and presumably the original one, too--is actually a children's book for adults. (Pamuk, for obvious reasons, cannot say this directly.) It is a beautiful book, true; but believing in it literally and thus rejecting rationality can, in the modern world, only lead to disaster. And the young men do indeed believe in it literally. Yes, big Mehmet, flying carpets are real.
The protagonist along with his lovely angel, Janan, set out to find the new world. The metaphor for this impossible task is taking long bus rides. During a bus journey, the world whizzes by. The passengers, as it were, are no longer part of that world but mere observers, as if all sights were of unsubstantial images rapidly passing by on a movie screen. They hope that the next stop will be heaven, but this never occurs. They do encounter, however, a series of serious accidents, resulting in many fatalities. Leaving this world behind and following chimera is dangerous, no doubt about it. (By the way, those who have traveled by bus in the developing world are more likely to accept as probable the many accidents depicted in the novel!)
Another irony: the father of Mehmet, one of the first to be taken in by the book, is a violent nationalist. He believes in what he calls "the Great Conspiracy," the deliberate corruption of Turkish culture by the West. He doesn't want a return to religion, but a return to (largely imagined) glories of the past. He has Uncle Rifki killed; he sets out to track down all the followers of the book and have them murdered.
In the world of the novel, secularists and fundamentalists have become as bitter rivals as Sunni and Shia. No matter what one's goal is, violence is viewed as the proper way of achieving it.
One of the most beautiful sections of the book concerns Mehmet, who has a long discussion with the protagonist, just before the latter kills him.
He has become an ascetic. He no longer literally believes in the book's contents. He copies the book with great mindfulness, creating works of art, as in Medieval Europe. He has become aware of "the internal music of the text" which for him is now more significant than its prose meaning. By all accounts, the Koran is a literary masterpiece. Like the original, this modern Koran has became for him "a good book," a delight in itself that needs no external references.
Here is what Mehmet says about the book, and presumably about all great religious classics: "Perhaps it is something that has been distilled from the stillness or the noise of the world, but it's not the stillness or the noise itself...It is futile to look outside the book for a realm that is located beyond the words." The realm does indeed exist, but only in the text and in us.
God, Pamuk implies, exists inside and not outside us. (And physics implies that inside and outside are one, the former (consciousness) causing the former, "reality," thus making the above statement moot. A belief such as this, however, makes fundamentalism and its resulting violence impossible.
He has become very wise indeed, this Mehmet. But he is murdered, indicating that wisdom is not going to resolve the current political mess--but, of course, there is still hope for Turkey and for all of us. There always exists the possibility that a future Mehmet will arise in the form of a competent statesman.
Pamuk's book brings up very important issues; as a consummate story teller, however, he never allows these issues to detract from delight in the story itself.
Too bad that it is unlikely that this book will result in readers who resolve to begin a new life, not based upon the latter-day Koran depicted in the novel, but upon Mehmet's wisdom.
Thomas Dorsett
August 1, 2013
Our online book club met this evening to discuss The New Life. This book was not popular among the other members. It received a range from one to three stars out of a possible five. One member thought the translation was bad; all of us agreed on that. The translator, Gumeli Gun, is obviously not a native speaker of English. Example: "Before expiring, a body had climbed over the seat.." Most thought that the characters were not well delineated. One thought that the novel was just too philosophical and political; it would have been better, this member of our club thought, to write an essay. A novel needs to tell a good story, and it was felt that this one was quite deficient in this regard. The reviewer, however,thought that the novel gave deeper insights into contemporary life--especially in Turkey--than most essays could provide--and in a much more entertaining fashion. This might not be his best novel, the reviewer conceded, but it is still quite a good one.
PLEASE GIVE US YOUR OPINION IN THE COMMENT SECTION
Our next meeting is on September 26, 2013 when will will discuss Tolstoy's Anna Karenena.
Hope you will join us!
Until then, Happy Reading!
Thomas Dorsett
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