Borderscape's - Border Experiences and Border Values in Emine Sevgi Ozdamar's Prose

In a laudatory speech for Emine Sevgi Ozdamar, the literary critic Sigrid Loffler points out: "The first thing that a human being realizes in life is the existence of borders. And the first thing that we learn is that we can also pass beyond boundaries. Life consists of nothing but transgressions and new border demarcations". This is why according to Loffler borders can be considered as "zones of higher presence of mind and of refined perception". The protagonists/narrators of Ozdamar's novels seem to have developed specific competencies for such zones. They are experts in limit experiences of all kinds; they express them and pass on their knowledge. The borderscapes-concept that is currently emerging in the human and social sciences stresses the cultural `constructedness' and the dynamics of borders. Ozdamar insists precisely on this arbitrary and fabricated character of borderlines. The purpose of my contribution is to fathom out the geographical and ideational "border-(land) scapes" the reader is confronted with in her novels.