Atatürk’s Nostos: From Odysseus to Anatolia

Here is the article written by Yurtsever:

History is not merely a list of events that occurred in the past. It is a space where every nation relives its own repressed pains and dreams. Odysseus’s return to Ithaca after a twenty-year journey and the statement heard in the words of Mustafa Kemal and Fatih Sultan Mehmet, “We have avenged Troy,” are not innocent stories. These are ideological narratives constructed by humans to bridge their sense of lack, transform the trauma they have experienced into victory, and gain legitimacy.

When Freud’s “return of the repressed,” Lacan’s concepts of the “Big Other” and desire, Zizek’s understanding of ideological fantasy, and Vamik Volkan’s theories of history are considered together, a clear link emerges between Odysseus’s return home and the modern Turkish national narrative.

The liberation of Anatolia is not just a military and political victory. It is the collective unconscious using an ancient myth to transform its own trauma into a “chosen victory.”

In Homer’s narrative, “nostos” (the return home) is not an ordinary journey. It is the human mind struggling with destructive realities. Odysseus’s twenty years are the time elapsed for repressed emotions to return. Ithaca is not just an island; it is what Lacan calls the “lost object”: the unreachable, longed-for home. Humans want to return to that initial and complete state; but this desire is bounded by the limits of the gods, laws, and fate. Poseidon’s anger is the feeling of guilt within man. The gouging out of Polyphemus’s eye is man facing his own primitive and wild side. Odysseus saying “Nobody” in the cave is a clever strategy: he temporarily abandons his identity, becomes invisible, and thus survives.

The same structure is seen in the Turkish national narrative. The Greek occupation is a sudden and destructive trauma. It is a threat that cannot be made sense of. To cope with this trauma, the collective consciousness invokes an ancient myth: the fall of Troy. Troy becomes the “chosen trauma,” while Dumlupınar becomes the “chosen victory” that repairs this trauma. The phrase “We have avenged Troy” is an example of the ideological fantasy described by Zizek. Ideology offers a framework that softens the pain of reality. The individual sees themselves not as the true subject of history, but as the payer of a very old debt. Thus, the East-West conflict shifts from a story of individual maturation into a national closure.

The stops on Odysseus’s journey are tests regarding human desires and their limits.

Circe traps men in animalistic pleasure by turning them into swine.

Calypso, on the other hand, offers immortality and eternal serenity. Yet, immortality is the end of desire. Because desire only exists with the awareness of lack and death. Odysseus, with the help of reason and boundaries, escapes this excessive pleasure and chooses Ithaca, which is difficult, incomplete, but real. A human can only reach their own identity by accepting the reality that they are mortal and incomplete.

These tests appear similarly in Atatürk’s struggle. Odysseus leaves Troy in victory but is far from his home. For Atatürk, the Armistice of Mudros and the Treaty of Sèvres were the moments when Anatolia was lost. The landing in Samsun is the rebirth of the desire to reach the lost homeland. Just as Odysseus becomes “Nobody,” Atatürk sets aside his official identity; he acts within the people as an anonymous will. He moves away from the pressure of Istanbul, the Sultan, and the occupiers.

The trap offered by Circe and Calypso is occupied Istanbul: the promise of compromise, oblivion, and the “continuation of the old order.” Crossing into Anatolia is rejecting this trap and choosing the difficult but real path.

When Odysseus descends into the underworld and speaks with the dead, he faces the repressed sides of the past. In the Turkish narrative, the revival of Fatih’s “vengeance of Troy” remark and the references Atatürk made to ancient Anatolia represent the same confrontation.

The Sirens, Scylla, and Charybdis show the necessity of balancing between both external and internal dangers. Atatürk also maintains the line of “national will” between external enemies and internal opposing forces. Just as Odysseus is left in Ithaca while asleep, the Treaty of Lausanne and the proclamation of the Republic are moments of awakening that come at the end of a long journey. But when Odysseus returns home, his house is full of strangers. Atatürk’s process of “cleansing the land of foreigners” and clearing out the old order is the same ritual: reclaiming the home.

Finally, Penelope’s test arrives. Even when Odysseus returns home, he is not immediately recognized. His identity is verified by a secret sign—the bed carved from an olive tree. The narrative of Anatolia’s liberation similarly seeks the sign of “indigeneity” that comes from the depths of history. The founding of the Republic is not just a military victory. It is the re-acceptance of fundamental values such as the will of the nation, sovereignty, and secularism. Myth dresses the collective memory in clean armor by smoothing over the complex and painful sides of history. But the underlying long migration, pain, and loss always remain as a trace.

In conclusion, Odysseus’s journey and Atatürk’s struggle unite on the following points:

* Anatolia as the lost object (Mother),

* Occupation as trauma,

* The break from Istanbul as the rejection of the trap of excessive pleasure,

* The vengeance of Troy as the return of the repressed,

* The Republic as the verification of identity.

This comparison removes history from being a simple success story. It makes it a living example of how societies transform their own pains and desires into a narrative.

Ümit Eren Yurtsever

Psychoanalyst

News Source: 12punto