Elif Safak
Elif Safak
Elif Şafakis a Turkish author, columnist, speaker and academic...
NationalityTurkish
ProfessionAuthor
CountryTurkey
mean infinite-time doe
Eternity does not mean infinite time, but simply timelessness
grief people empathy
After the Ankara bombings on October 10, people were asked to hold a minute of silence, but many refused. Our society can't even unite in grief to honor the victims. We've lost our empathy. That's maybe the worst.
land people literature
Isn't connecting people to distant lands and culture one of the strengths of good literature?
cities childhood forget
But let us not forget that cities are like human beings. They are born, they go through childhood and adolescence, they grow old, and eventually they die
humanity saint
A saint belongs to all humanity.
mind like-her speak
perhaps it took a stranger to make a woman like her speak her mind.
giving ignorant bears
Either grant me the bliss of the ignorant or give me the strength to bear the knowledge.
rabbits culture rabbit-holes
We cannot abandon this rabbit hole for fear of a traumatic encounter with our own culture.
book ends feels
You see, unlike in the movies, there is no THE END sign flashing at the end of books. When I've read a book, I don't feel like I've finished anything. So I start a new one.
distance feminist leader
Feminists are now being vilified in politics, erdogan used to speak more embracingly, saying he was the leader of everyone, whether they voted for him or not. He sounds as if he puts a distance between himself and half the nation.
media land turkeys
Words are heavy in Turkey, and every writer, every poet and every journalist knows that, because of a word, because of a sentence, because of a tweet or even a retweet, you can be sued, you can be demonized by the media and you can even land in prison.
people pace world
The digital world is developing with such force and such a pace that you simply can't ban or control it. People want to be globally connected.
europe turkeys people
Turkey has a very young, dynamic, curious population. In Europe, Facebook and Twitter are mostly about sharing daily experiences while for Turkish people, social networks are political platforms.
believe government optimism
I believe in optimism of the will, pessimism of the intellect. But my hope is the people, the society, which is ahead of the government.