Bridging Cultures Through Storytelling

Elif Shafak is one of the most influential novelists and thinkers of our time, using her words

as a bridge between cultures. Born in France, raised in Turkey, and educated in

multiple countries, Shafak saw early in life that identity is not a fixed place — it’s a mosaic.

Often writing in both English and Turkish, she explores themes like love,

exile, gender, and freedom. Her bestseller, “The Forty Rules

of Love,” brought Sufi mysticism to the modern reader through the story of Rumi — reminding

us that spirituality isn’t separate from daily life, but woven into it. But Shafak’s courage

extends beyond literature. She has been prosecuted in Turkey for addressing taboo subjects like the Armenian genocide