Navigating Istanbul

Urban migration in Turkey experienced a remarkable surge following the nation’s independence from the Ottoman Empire. People from rural backgrounds started flocking to bigger metropolises in search of better lives and job opportunities. Orhan Pamuk’s novel A Strangeness in My Mind skillfully captures the life of a migrant, Mevlut Karataș, from the 1960s to the early twenty-first century. The flâneur figure, associated with bourgeois urban modernity and theorized by the likes of Benjamin and Baudelaire, is reinterpreted by Pamuk through his street vendor protagonist whose travels through Istanbul’s city streets follow the trajectory of Turkey’s modernization. In a world where migration has reemerged as a critical focus for researchers, engaging deeply with its complexities is essential. Our understanding of urban Istanbul’s landscape has been mostly limited to and seen through the eyes of upper-class characters. To address this gap, we have situated Mevlut as a migrant flâneur straddling the worlds of tradition and modernity. As a boza seller, he has access to the houses of the rich and the poor, the secular and the conservative. The article places Mevlut’s narrative in the larger context of Istanbul’s socioeconomic, political, and architectural transition. Referring to Henry Lefebvre’s concept, the article explores the contrasting fates of the migrant characters in the city, tracing their alienation and assimilation, and makes a case for the inhabitants’ right to the city in an urban space. We argue that Mevlut finally claims his “right to the city as an oeuvre” by inscribing his life story on its street walls.