Ali and Ramazan


Ali and Ramazan is a novel by Turkish writer Perihan Mağden, first published in 2010. The novel tells the story of two teenager gay boys with polar characteristics drawn into each other, forming an intense friendship in milieu of man-dominated, materialistic, and oppressive pressures. The novel was translated in English by Ruth Whitehouse and published in the Las Vegas, United States in 2012. Theater play "GarajIstanbul" was exhibited in 2013.

Plot summary

Ali and Ramazan are two boys from very different backgrounds who land in the same Istanbul orphanage. They quickly see eye to eye and fall into a loving relationship as children, bringing light to one another and to the other orphans in their dreary adopted home. Ramazan is a charmer, the school master's favorite, the clown among the boys, and the only one with a real handle on things outside the orphanage's walls. He takes Ali under his wing, and by the time they turn eighteen and are loosed onto Istanbul's mean streets, Ali and Ramazan are a pair. What happens next is both tragic and beautiful, a testament to love finding its way even among the least visible citizens on Turkey's mean streets.