Darcy's Reviews > My Name Is Red

Generally, when a book starts out with a chapter entitled "I Am A Corpse," you know it's going to be pretty good.

The novel is set up so that each chapter introduces a different narrator, including (but not limited to), Black, Black's uncle, Shekure, a dog, a horse, the murderer and various artists in the workshop. This type of structure for a mystery novel isn't new--Wilkie Collins, for example, employed it several times, most notably in The Moonstone--and it is an effective way to structure a story so as to hide the whodunit. Each character only tells as much as he, she or it knows and in Pamuk's novel even the murderer hides his or her identity.

The structure in "My Name Is Red," though is less designed to sustain suspense and more to allow room for the various philosophical discussions concerning the purpose of art and, perhaps more importantly, the distinctions between Islamic states and Western Europe. The Frankish mode of painting, particularly of portraiture--to glorify the subject, to paint him or her in terms of his/her earthly wealth and power, to distribute such an image openly as a show of control, to demonstrate the creative abilities of the artist--is at the center of these debates and discussions. Black's uncle finds such images alluring and fascinating while others see them as abhorent. Master Osman, for example, sees himself as being forced to choose between the centuries old Islamic traditions he venerates and the more modern and distinctly foreign style he despises. Such a choice is not made easily, as the artists themselves discover. The Frankish method celebrates the individuation of the artist--it prizes the signature of the artist as much as the commissioner of the image. This reverence for the artist, as much as for the piece of art, proves to be a great temptation to the men involved and leads directly to the murder.

The structure, however, also allows for a second discussion, not about art but about writing on art. As much as this is a novel concerning visual images, it is also a novel about ekphrasis--the verbal description of art. Ekphrasis has the effect of slowing down a narrative, of interrupting it. Thus, in Homer's Illiad, the great battle scene is suddenly punctured by a lengthy description of Achilles' shield. Pamuk plays with this model repeatedly. When the image of the horse, described several times in the novel, is given a voice of its own the narrative is not interrupted, but rather the description of the image becomes the narrative. And, moreover, as the image speaks it refutes the fundamental principles underlying Master Osman's devotion to Islamic traditions of art. Pamuk can hardly resist the joke--this is a novel about art in which not a single image appears, except the map at the beginning and the ones we create in our minds as we imagine the images described. But, are we creating an image of the ideal horse, the horse of God, or one we can actually touch, taste, and smell?