Boundless Solitude

Few people carry a sea within them, but that night I saw it. Because of her tears. Because she embraced me. Because the sliver of ice that slashed at my heart sloqly melted away. That night, I saw within Elem a vast sea opening up into infinity.

Whem Handan Sarp, a soprano at the Istanbul City Opera, meets Elem, a young seamstress, her world is rent asunder. Handan struggles to come to terms with herself as a lesbian in a society in which same-sex love is vilified and opera is seen as the domain of the elite. Handan has always questioned socially accepted notions of love, sex and morality, but her revolt comes with a bitter price to pay.

Boundless Solitude, written by award-winnign Turkish author Selim İleri, offers a rare panorama of life in Istanbul in the 1980s, and though Handan's recollections of her youth and relationships, the novel explores the city's queer underworld. It is a tale of desire and obsesion, and a meditation on the haunting power of nostalgia.