‘The Other’ at the border: literary sieges and identity construction

In the 20th century, the issue of creating a national identity and fashioning the self gained significant importance as a consequence of the increasing nationalist movements and establishment of the unitary states with the collapse of empires. To create a collective identity consciousness in society, literature was utilized as one of the mediums, as it can be used in the service of different ideologies. First published in 1899, Eclipse of the Crescent Moon (Egri Csillagok) by Géza Gárdonyi focuses on creating the Hungarian national identity through the Turks, whereas The Siege (Kështjella) by ...Daha fazlası