Meet UCL Dutch Writer in Residence 2023-24: Tülin Erkan

UCL Dutch is delighted to welcome 2023-24 writer in residence Tülin Erkan, a Belgian-Turkish writer who received much critical acclaim for her debut novel, Honingeters (Honey Eaters)

For many years now, Dutch Studies has been hosting a literary translation project, in which the writer in residence collaborates with our final year students to produce a literary translation to be published on a Low Countries or international literary platform or publication. The writer-in-residence also partakes in one or two literature classes.

Tülin Erkan (b. 1988) grew up in Ostende, Flanders with a French-speaking mother and an English-speaking grandmother, spending her summers with her father in Turkey. She is the author of Honingeter, or Honeyeater, her debut novel which got nominated for the longlist the Book Voucher Literary Prize, and the shortlists of the Bronze Owl and the Boon Literature Prize.

It is a beautiful novel about longing for a home when one is constantly in transit, about what it means to be seen even if we are constantly under surveillance, about the importance of language to feel at home in a place as well as in a body, about how rituals and habits can anchor us in a location whereas they can also disturb our sense of time, about the paradox that pretending can offer one footing, about how arriving is always saying goodbye and vice versa. It is ultimately a novel that harbours a quiet sadness but which is nevertheless alive through its attention for detail in its description of people and the spaces in which they dwell.

UCL Dutch finalists work on a translation of an excerpt of this novel, in collaboration with Dutch students at the University of Sheffield, as part of the annual Translation Project, sponsored by the Dutch Language Union and Literature Flanders. They work in collaboration with professional translator Jonathan Reed, and their translation will be published on the De Lage Landen/The Low Countries platform. You can find a report of the translation project on their website too. 

A public event will be held on 11th December at UCL. Using film clips and other visual material, Erkan will be in conversation with Dr. Hans Demeyer (UCL) to discuss her work and its themes of multilingualism, moving between cultures and attachment.

Photo: Wouter van Vooren