DECONSTRUCTING BINARIES AND SPIRITUALITY: A POSTMODERN AND INTERTEXTUAL ANALYSIS OF HISTORY IN ELIF SHAFAK’S THE FORTY RULES OF LOVE

Abstract

In this study, the novel The Forty Rules of Love by Elif Shafak is critically analyzed based on its advanced technique of mixing the historical story with postmodern fiction. The study draws on the theoretical concepts of postmodern historiography and intertextuality to develop the ways in which Shafak dismantles conventional binaries, including past/present, East/West and realism/spiritualism, to develop an alternative form of historical metafiction. The focus of the analysis is twofold: first, to analyze the way in which the idea of Sufism is applied in the form of bridge in order to merge the historical (13th century) and the contemporary (21st century) narratives; and, second, to distinguish and interpret the main aspects of postmodernism that orchestrate the novel. In a qualitative, intertextual, pastiche, and temporal distortion, and binaries deconstruction approach to the novel, this study contends that Shafak utilizes these strategies not only as forms of style but as principles of pluralistic, love-focused philosophy based upon Sufism. The paper is finding that the novel is a critical discourse that promotes the cosmopolitan, spiritual interpretation of Islam that goes beyond cultural and temporal division.