Literary Developments in Modern Turkey

LITERARY DEVELOPMENTS IN MODERN TURKEY INiyazi Berkes One has yet to find even a general survey in English of modem Turkish literature, although English scholarship can boast of having produced the best account of the premodern or classical Turkish literature in any language. Unsurpassed for the period it covers, E. I. W. Gibb's six-volume A History of Ottoman Poetry (London, 1900-1909) deals almost exclusively with literature before the nineteenth century and, as the title indicates, only with the poetic form. And in fact, poetry was the genre in which the men of literature expressed the Turkish literary art best until the middle of the nineteenth century. Only then did prose, particnlarly the play, short story, novel, and essay, begin to depose classical poetry. In doing so it revolutionized the language and literary standards, took pre-eminence in artistic expression and social influence, and, eventually, gave rise to an entirely new poetry. The rise and development of modem Turkish literature can be exemplified best by a survey of the evolution of the Turkish novel and short story in particnlar. These deserve the close attention of English readers because they represent the main forward drifts in the literary course of modem Turkey. Furthermore, they have reflected various aspects of the social and cnltural transformation taking place in the Turkish society and have influenced that transformation to some degree. Therefore, some Turkish novels and short stories deserve translation as characteristic products of modem Turkish literature. The present account does not presume to be a full or exhaustive exposition of the history of modem Turkish literature. It is a descriptive analysis with primary reference to the social origin and rOle of the Turkish novel and short story over the past century. I Pre-modem Turkish literature, like the literatures of other Muslim countries, did not contain the literary species known as the "novel." It 226 NIYAZI BERKES is true that there was the tradition of the epic story, popular romances, and folk stories and tales in addition to the so-called classical literary forms patterned after basically Persian and Arabic models. Though these influenced the Turkish novel in its infancy, as we shall illustrate later, none of these forms can be said to have fallen within the category of the novel. The Turkish novel, like a few other new literary forms such as journalism and the drama, was born when noticeable changes began to occur in the Turkish society. Then, new means were sought to express the new ideas. The event that did most for the coming of the novel was the opening of the age of reforms known among the Turks as the Tanzimat. Officially proclaimed in 1838, it was characterized by a drive towards modernization with Western civilization serving as the model. This was the beginning of a trend oriented towards the West in both politics and culture. It was claimed that the modernization desired would be on the basis of the traditional heritage and that it would result in a synthesis of the old and the new. Inevitably, however, a series of changes or, at least, a series of maladjustments ensued once the political and cultural gates enclosing the traditional society were opened. In fact, a series of just such changes took place in the economic, military , governmental, legal, and educational sectors of the social life between 1839 and 1870. The innovations and their natnral outcome--culture conflicts-were rellected very quickly in intellectnal and literary life. New ideas and new literary experiences began to develop alongside and even in competition with the traditional ones. This is apparent even from the midcentury . The appearance of the newspaper was, perhaps, the most important factor in the rise and development of the new intellectual and literary trends. It is true that printing in Turkish had been started much earlier, in 1727, and that the first Turkish newspaper had made its appearance before the coming of the Tanzimat era, in 1831. Nevertheless, neither had had an immediate effect upon the rise of a modern literature, although both contributed to it by influencing the rise of a secular intellectnal class and by inducing changes in the highly formal and artificial Ottoman Turkish...