Intelligence Squared Podcast Summary

Episode Title: Fascism, Exile, and Redefining Home in the 21st Century, with Ece Temelkuran
Host: Maithili Rao
Guest: Ece Temelkuran, Turkish Writer and Political Thinker
Date: February 13, 2026

Episode Overview

This episode of Intelligence Squared features award-winning Turkish author and political thinker Ece Temelkuran in conversation with Maithili Rao. The discussion centers on Temelkuran’s new book, Nation of Strangers, which explores profound themes of exile, the meaning of home, and the collective experience of moral and political displacement amidst the global rise of authoritarianism and fascism. The conversation blends personal narrative, political analysis, and reflections on hope and solidarity for those feeling unmoored in today’s world.

Key Discussion Points and Insights

Ece Temelkuran’s Location and Ongoing Experience of Exile

• Temelkuran joins the conversation from Berlin, which she dubs “the world capital of strangers” (02:58), reflecting on her transient existence—from Hamburg to Zagreb to Berlin—since leaving Turkey in 2016.
• Humorous anecdotes about Turkish coffee in Germany segue into the ongoing negotiation of what can be “translated” or recreated when removed from home, connecting daily ritual to identity and longing (03:20–04:34).

Defining Fascism in the 21st Century

• Temelkuran addresses her pointed choice to consistently use “fascism” instead of softer terms like “populism” or “authoritarianism”, recounting how Western publishers resisted the term in 2019 but now embrace it (05:29–08:18).
  • Quote: “Once you call it fascism, you have to do something about it... If you just call it right-wing populism, authoritarianism... you can relax and wait till it passes. But I think what we are going through is not something we can just shelter ourselves by being patient.” (07:32)

The Complexities of “Exile”

• Temelkuran expresses deep ambivalence about the term “exile,” highlighting its privileged connotations versus the more precarious status of refugees and migrants (08:45–11:25).
• Quote: "As an exile, when you're appreciated, when you're praised, when you're welcomed, embraced, you become the aristocrat of the homeless people. And that discrepancy, that inequality between the refugee, immigrant and exile was morally disturbing for me." (09:27)
• Discusses moral, political, and emotional dimensions: moral guilt over privilege, resistance to glorification by Western societies, and the existential permanence of being seen as “exiled.”

Letter Form and Universal Homelessness

• The book adopts the form of letters to “a dear stranger,” chosen for the “intimacy” and “whisper” it offers in a time when “everybody’s shouting” (12:24).
• The concept expands exile from personal plight to collective experience, observing how political disintegration, climate change, and modern crises mean “we are all…in the process of losing our homes” (11:25).
  • Quote: “Only through the homelessness of the world, I could find myself…Exiles, refugees, homeless people, immigrants—we all live in ‘survival mode’ constantly.” (13:02)

Genre and Literary Purpose

• Temelkuran resists strict genre classification, seeing the book as “a book of literature more than anything else” and the completion of a “10-year long political sentence” begun with How to Lose a Country and Together (15:13–16:16).
  • Quote: “With Nation of Strangers, I think I came to the heart of the problem: this is our home, this planet that we are losing through climate change; we’re losing our ultimate home.” (16:31)

Founding a New Home in Language and Words

• Temelkuran’s discovery: home cannot be reclaimed physically but can be rebuilt in words—“the only indestructible material that we are left with” (16:16–18:39).
  • Quote: "I wanted to build a home in my homelessness and I understood that the only possible way in today's world is to build it with words." (17:38)

The Gaza Strip: A Moral Turning Point

• Highlights a powerful metaphor from the book: “the Gaza Strip, a long, bleeding, thin scar on the world map, is widening to become a fatal gangrene swallowing up the entire body of humanity...” (18:39–19:10).
  • Temelkuran characterizes Gaza as a “moral experiment” demonstrating how far global powers can push “the genocide against all that is humane” (19:10–22:00).
  • Quote: “Gaza was a moral experiment…to see if the new world order is ready to be accepted by humanity.” (20:21)

Internal vs. External Destruction & Faith

• The conversation shifts from external consequences of violence to the “interior destruction” and loss of faith resulting from upheaval and displacement (22:00–25:28).
  • Quote: “Losing faith is the ultimate defeat, is the ultimate despair…if you experience such a level of moral defeat, you cannot come from it. So you have to mend that faith to begin with.” (23:50)

The Chilling Encounter with Tech Elites and AI

• Temelkuran recounts a disturbing experience at a tech-investor retreat in the Alps, where “nihilism” reigned and some imagined a future indifferent to or devoid of humanity (25:28–28:20).
  • Quote: “When you look at darkness for too long, human eye loses the will to see the light. So we have to turn to light to see the whole picture about humanity one and to be able to see again.” (27:16)
• Raises concerns that AI may take over humanity’s “spiritual home”—language—and shares tentative thoughts about approaching AI with creative, “loving” engagement, instead of fear (28:20–29:51).

Literature and Poetry as Guideposts

• The discussion highlights three central poems: Cavafy’s “Waiting for the Barbarians,” Homer’s Odyssey, and Elizabeth Bishop’s “One Art” (36:25–41:01).
  • Odysseus's journey frames the existential question: “What if there is no going back home?” (36:25)
  • Cavafy’s poem represents the heart of fascism and “the fear of the other.”
  • Bishop’s “One Art” as a meditation on losing what cannot be recovered.
• Temelkuran connects literary tradition to her personal background—growing up in Izmir, surrounded by remnants of Greek mythology (39:11–39:37).

Home, Childhood, and Consolation

• The episode closes with personal and literary reflections on home—how leaving home is both a theme of nostalgia and transformation in children’s stories (41:17–42:26).
  • Temelkuran reveals her own childhood idol, Dirty Sally, a character always “on the road”—hinting she may have always had a complicated relationship with home (“maybe I did this to myself” (44:28)).

Book Recommendation

• Temelkuran recommends Daniel Kehlmann’s novel The Director, about an artist navigating Nazi rule—a story she describes as “amazing,” relevant to understanding personal integrity under authoritarianism (44:33–45:12).

Notable Quotes & Timestamps

• “Why don’t you call it fascism? ...Because once you call it fascism, you have to do something about it.” — Ece Temelkuran (07:32)
• “As an exile, ...you become the aristocrat of the homeless people.” — Ece Temelkuran (09:27)
• “Only through the homelessness of the world, I could find myself...” — Ece Temelkuran (13:02)
• “I wanted to build a home in my homelessness...the only possible way in today’s world is to build it with words.” — Ece Temelkuran (17:38)
• “The Gaza Strip, a long, bleeding, thin scar on the world map, is widening to become a fatal gangrene swallowing up the entire body of humanity.” — Ece Temelkuran (19:10)
• “People have lost faith in themselves, in each other, in politics, in the world, in humanity, in the future...and losing faith is the ultimate defeat.” — Ece Temelkuran (23:50)
• “When you look at darkness for too long, human eye loses the will to see the light.” — Ece Temelkuran (27:16)
• On AI: “AI is going to steal away our spiritual home, which is language.” — Ece Temelkuran (28:20)
• “One of the most important sentences in my life…from Walter Benjamin…‘the only thing that you cannot remedy is not running away from home when you’re 16.’” — Ece Temelkuran (43:08)

Important Timestamps

• [02:58] Temelkuran describes her current life in Berlin and movement across Europe.
• [05:29] Discussion on the deliberate use of the term “fascism.”
• [08:45] Temelkuran’s complex relationship with the word “exile.”
• [12:24] How letter form and intimacy inform Nation of Strangers.
• [16:16] The “completion of a political sentence” and literary ambitions of the book.
• [18:39] Gaza metaphor as a wound spreading across global moral conscience.
• [22:00] Addressing interior, moral ruin and the loss of faith.
• [25:28] Recounts unsettling tech retreat and reflections on AI and the future.
• [36:25] Exploration of literary touchstones: Odyssey, “Waiting for the Barbarians”, “One Art.”
• [44:33] Temelkuran recommends Daniel Kehlmann’s The Director.

Tone and Style

• The conversation is both deeply personal and strikingly political, blending philosophical insight, literary allusion, and practical urgency.
• Temelkuran’s language is direct, often poetic, and full of sharp metaphors and candid humor.

For listeners and readers, this episode provides a moving meditation on shared displacement, the dangers and disguises of modern fascism, and the ongoing human task of building a home—literal and figurative—amidst uncertainty and loss.