2000. Many
works of literature not readily identified with the mystery or detective story
genre nonetheless involve the investigation of a mystery. In these works, the solution to the mystery
may be less important than the knowledge gained in the process of its
investigation. Choose a novel or play in
which one or more of the characters confront a mystery. Then write an essay in which you identify the
mystery and explain how the investigation illuminates the meaning of the work
as a whole. Do not merely summarize the
plot.
Orhan Pamuk’s My Name Is Red is essentially a mystery
novel, revolving around the murder of a miniaturist. However, even though the
story starts with a corpse asking for revenge and ends with the revelation of
the murderer, the investigations take a back seat in the story. In fact, it
does not even make a difference who is the murderer: the only purpose of even
having this plotline is to expose readers to some of the topics in the book,
such as the clash between the East and West.
Outline:
1.
How the meaning is revealed
a.
Through anecdotes
i.
Almost every chapter is full of anecdotes from various
Islamic books and histories, e.g. Hüsrev and Shirin, the life of Bihzad,
stories of Shahs
b.
Knowing the murderer does not make a difference at all
2.
Revelations from the investigations
a.
Deaths symbolize the deaths of tradition
i.
Elegant was killed because he disagreed with the new method
of painting
ii.
Enishte was killed because he disagreed with the
Islamic idea of eternity
iii.
However, the souls of the dead still remain and narrate
the story
b.
Insight into traditional values:
i.
the joys of painting (Osman)
c.
Information seeks to make us understand the other side
1. Methods of revelation
The mystery that binds the whole story together is the
murder of one of the Sultan’s miniaturists, Elegant Effendi, and then later the
murder of Black’s uncle, Enishte Effendi.
Almost all of the discussions on the book’s themes are presented
through anecdotes. There are hundreds of anecdotes scattered throughout the
narrative, providing numerous insights into the thinking and reasoning of
Turkish Ottomans. A few examples of the allusion to other works of literature
are stories like Hüsrev and Shirin and . These anecdotes reveal Islamic
attitudes to topics such as style and eternity, giving us a sympathetic perspective
on the side of the Ottomans. For example, one of the Sultan’s favoured
miniaturists, Olive, told three anecdotes about the Qur’an’s concept of
eternity and about how “time ends for the one who forsakes the perfect life and
perfect illuminating, leaving nothing but death” (Pamuk 120), showing the
belief that true eternity can be found in art.
2. Importance of the investigations
The deaths of both Elegant Effendi and Enishte Effendi
symbolize the “death” or fading away of Ottoman traditions. Elegant Effendi was
killed because he believed that Western art is “heresy, a sacrilege that no
decent man would have the gall to commit” (Pamuk 29). What he is referring to
is that Western art is the opposite of what the Qur’an teaches about paintings:
Islamic art is all about accompanying the story and depicting a “perfect” world
of perfectly drawn archetypes. Western art at the time of the Renaissance is about
perfectly rendering all imperfections and painting exactly what the eye sees,
which is why Enishte is so surprised when he goes to Venice and sees that “you
would immediately know which particular nobleman it was [in the portrait]” (Pamuk 41), because they included all the
imperfections of the human appearance.
Consequently, the murderer could also be considered a symbol
of the cunning and ruthless Western civilization, who is gradually enveloping
other societies with its breathtaking but aggressive culture. This can be
explained further by Enishte’s death at the hands of the same murderer, because
the murderer refused to accept that the version of eternity provided by the Qur’an,
that eventually “[their] methods will die out, our colors will fade… [and]
indifference, time and disaster will destroy [their] art” (Pamuk 273).
These investigations also led us to discover other
traditional values, such as the Islamic philosophy on paintings. In a particular
scene, Master Osman ventures deep down into the Sultan’s Treasury with Black
and pores through all the paintings and books in search of clues to the . What they
discovered down there revealed incredible things about Ottoman art, history,
and philosophy. In particular, that scene reveals the nature of blindness in
Master Osman’s perspective: only in blindness can people see the true images
Allah sees.
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