The Representation of the Refugees’ Dilemma through the Lenses of Edward Said’s Orientalism A Post-Colonial Study of Alan Drew’s Gardens of Water

Abstract

Said’s Orientalism theory identifies what he argues the wrong picture of the “Orient” or the East produced by western scholars, historians, cultural and legal theorists, and colonial rulers, given the west’s primary goal of controlling everything in the East. The Western writers, as Said thinks, frequently reflect on the portrayal of the East through insulting and inferior acts that depict the East as uncivilized and in need of support and enlightenment from the West. Gardens of Water, by the American Alan Drew, is a fascinating and extraordinary novel about people trying to define themselves in a world that seems to be against them. Drew discusses clashes between cultures, religions, and generations with reverence and understanding, and it’s a true triumph. This is an enthralling novel about two families and two religions in Turkey during the 1999 earthquake. The current study analyzes Alan Drew’s novel Gardens of Water in the light of Said’s perspectives of Orientalism in order to see how the western author, Alan Drew, portrays non-Western culture in the novel. The novel, also, draws a vivid image of refugees and the difficulties they face as they try to survive their lives and find a safe place, in relation to a postcolonial reading to analyze the other.