Selim Işık’s Agony in Oğuz Atay’s "Tutunamayanlar"

This paper discusses the source and aspects of agony vexing Selim Işık the protagonist to a suicide at an early age in Oğuz Atay’s Tutunamayanlar. In this respect, Selim Işık’s Sartrianly defiant disposition is demonstrated by drawing upon specific quotations taken from the novel. In the paper, an intertextual method of comparison is occasionally employed by dint of references to another remarkable miserable protagonist in Turkish Literature – namely Doktor Hikmet in Yakup Kadri Karaosmanoğlu’s Bir Sürgün. Besides, throughout the article where available and applicable, references are made to some canonical works of Western Literature including Ibsen’s tragedies, Kafka’s Metamorphosis, and Shakespeare’s Hamlet in order to further substantiate and accentuate the arguments made.