Kemal Tahir (March 13, 1910 – April 21, 1973) was a prominent Turkish
novelist
A novelist is an author or writer of novels, though often novelists also write in other genres of both fiction and non-fiction. Some novelists are professional novelists, thus make a living wage, living writing novels and other fiction, while othe ...
and
intellectual
An intellectual is a person who engages in critical thinking, research, and reflection about the reality of society, and who proposes solutions for the normative problems of society. Coming from the world of culture, either as a creator o ...
. Tahir spent 13 years of his life imprisoned for political reasons and wrote some of his most important novels during this time.
His most important novels include ''Esir Şehrin İnsanları'' (1956), ''Devlet Ana'' (1967) and ''Yorgun Savaşçı'' (1965), in all of which Tahir uses historical background to support his characters and settings. Some of his novels were adapted into popular films. Tahir also wrote
pulp fiction
''Pulp Fiction'' is a 1994 American crime film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino, who conceived it with Roger Avary.See, e.g., King (2002), pp. 185–7; ; Starring John Travolta, Samuel L. Jackson, Bruce Willis, Tim Roth, Ving Rha ...
under
pseudonyms
A pseudonym (; ) or alias () is a fictitious name that a person or group assumes for a particular purpose, which differs from their original or true name ( orthonym). This also differs from a new name that entirely or legally replaces an individu ...
for financial reasons.
Biography
Kemal Tahir was born on March 13, 1910. His father Tahir Bey was a navy captain and an adviser to Sultan Abdulhamit II. After graduating from Hasan Paşa Rüşdiyesi (secondary school), Kemal Tahir enrolled to
Galatasaray High School
Galatasaray High School ( tr, Galatasaray Lisesi, french: Lycée de Galatasaray), established in what was then Constantinople and is now Istanbul, in 1481, is the oldest high school in Turkey. It is also the second-oldest Turkish educational in ...
. But after his mother's death, he dropped out high school at 10th grade and began working as a lawyer's clerk, and later as a journalist. He worked as a journalist, editor and a translator at ''Vakit'', ''Haber'' and ''Son Posta'' newspapers in İstanbul. He worked as a page editor at ''Karikatür'' and ''Yeni Gün'' newspapers. He became lead writer for the newspaper ''Karagöz'' and later worked as the editor-in-chief at ''Tan''. He married Fatma İrfan in 1937.
In 1938, Kemal Tahir and
Nazım Hikmet
A nazim is the coordinator of a city or town in Pakistan.
Nazim or variant spellings may also refer to:
* Nazim (given name), including a list of people with the given name
* Nazim (surname), including a list of people with the surname
See also
...
was accused of "spreading sedition" amongst the armed forces by the Navy Command Court Martial, was subsequently found guilty and sentenced to 15 years in prison. He served time in
Çankırı
Çankırı, historically known as Gangra (Greek: Γάγγρα), is the capital city of Çankırı Province, in Turkey, about northeast of Ankara. It is situated about 800 m (2500 ft) above sea level.
History
Çankırı was known in ...
,
Malatya
Malatya ( hy, Մալաթիա, translit=Malat'ya; Syro-Aramaic ܡܠܝܛܝܢܐ Malīṭīná; ku, Meletî; Ancient Greek: Μελιτηνή) is a large city in the Eastern Anatolia region of Turkey and the capital of Malatya Province. The city ...
,
Çorum
Çorum () (Medieval Greek: Ευχάνεια, romanized: Euchaneia) is a northern Anatolian city that is the capital of the Çorum Province of Turkey. Çorum is located inland in the central Black Sea Region of Turkey, and is approximately from A ...
,
Nevşehir
Nevşehir (from the Persian compound ''Now-shahr'' meaning "new city"), formerly Neapolis (Ancient Greek: Νεάπολις) and Muşkara, is a largely modern city and the capital district of Nevşehir Province in the Central Anatolia Region of T ...
and
Kırşehir
Kırşehir, formerly Mocissus ( grc, Μωκισσός) and Justinianopolis (Ἰουστινιανούπολις), is a city in Turkey. It is the capital district of the Kırşehir Province. According to the 2000 census, the population of the distri ...
prisons. Twelve years later, he was released in the general amnesty of 1950.
Following his release, Kemal Tahir returned to Istanbul and started working as Istanbul correspondent of ''İzmir Ticaret'' newspaper. He married his second wife Semiha Sıdıka. He wrote romance and adventure novels and film scripts, using aliases such as "Körduman", "Bedri Eser", "Samim Aşkın", "f. m. ikinci", "Nurettin Demir", or "Ali Gıcırlı". He also undertook translations from French. He was taken into custody again following the 6–7 September incidents in 1955 and served six months in the Harbiye military prison. Upon his release he ran Düşün Publishing, which he co-founded with the writer
Aziz Nesin
Aziz Nesin (; born Mehmet Nusret, 20 December 1915 – 6 July 1995) was a Turkish writer, humorist and the author of more than 100 books. Born in a time when Turks did not have official surnames, he had to adopt one after the Surname Law of 1 ...
.
He worked on film scripts with directors such as
Metin Erksan
İsmail Metin Erksan (1 January 1929 – 4 August 2012) was a Turkish film director and art historian.
Biography
Erksan was born in Çanakkale. Following his graduation from Pertevniyal High School in Istanbul, he studied art history at Istan ...
,
Halit Refiğ
Halit Refiğ (5 March 1934 – 11 October 2009) was a Turkish film director, film producer, screenwriter and writer. He made around sixty films, including feature films, documentaries and TV serials. He is considered to be the pioneer of the N ...
and
Atıf Yılmaz
Atıf Yılmaz Batıbeki (9 December 1925 – 5 May 2006) was a renowned Turkish film director, screenwriter, and film producer. He was very much a legend in the film industry of Turkey with 119 movies directed. He also wrote 53 screenplays and ...
.
He travelled to the
USSR
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...
in 1968.
After having a lung operation in 1970, Tahir worked on vernacularizing Marxist terminology and creating a national left ideology, which would suit a Turkish-Anatolian socio-cultural identity. In doing so, he was criticized by many left wing intellectuals. During a particularly heated debate, Kemal Tahir suffered a heart attack and died on April 21, 1973.
Ideology
The foundation of Kemal Tahir's ideology can be broadly described as Marxist. As a writer and a political activist, he saw a contradiction between the socio-cultural and political structure of Turkey and solutions that Marxism offers. Due to his belief that Westernization was something that did not quite fit Turkish society, he found Marxism somewhat lacking. Marxist historical theory is based on the existence of a bourgeois class, something that did not develop in the Ottoman Empire (as in many other 'peripheral countries'). Perhaps the greatest intellectual struggle of Tahir's was in reshaping Marxist historical theory to the reality of Turkish history.
After studying
Marx
Karl Heinrich Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, economist, historian, sociologist, political theorist, journalist, critic of political economy, and socialist revolutionary. His best-known titles are the 1848 ...
Halil İnalcık
Halil İnalcık (7 September 1916 – 25 July 2016) was a Turkish historian. His highly influential research centered on social and economic approaches to the Ottoman Empire. His academic career started at Ankara University, where he completed hi ...
,
Niyazi Berkes
Niyazi Berkes (21 October 1908 – 18 December 1988) was a Turkish Cypriot sociologist.
Early life and education
Berkes was born in Nicosia, the capital of Cyprus, on 21 September 1908, shortly after the Young Turk Revolution in Turkey.
and
Şerif Mardin
Şerif Mardin (1927 – 6 September 2017) was a prominent Turkish sociologist, political scientist, academic and thinker. In a 2008 publication, he was referred to as the "doyen of Turkish sociology."
Early life and education
He was born in Ista ...
. His conclusion was that Ottoman-Turkish society does not follow euro-centric primitive/slavery/feodality/capitalism socio-historical model. It has its own special evolution process, structural differences, dynamics and conditions based on its cultural and social structure. So Westernization, whether in form of capitalism or communism, is trying to bring an abstract and formal superstructure to a society which does not have the necessary substructure. Without a fundamental economic and social revolution this kind of exercises would be nothing but an absurd mimicry.
In frame of this ideology, Kemal Tahir aimed to describe the Ottoman society in his works which was based on a humanist foundation which was very different from European feudal and later capitalist society. He tried to emphasize a "Turkish reality" in his novels.
In his writing career, which was in socio-realist line, he used a simple language that was enriched with dialogues and charismatic characters. He was one of the most productive novelists of
Turkish literature
Turkish literature ( tr, Türk edebiyatı) comprises oral compositions and written texts in Turkic languages. The Ottoman and Azerbaijani forms of Turkish, which forms the basis of much of the written corpus, were highly influenced by Persian a ...
.
Works
Kemal Tahir started to literature with poetry. His first poems were published in ''İçtihad'' magazine in 1931. He got published poems in ''Yeni Kültür'', ''Geçit'', ''Var'' and ''Ses'' magazines.
His first major work was a four-part novella that was published at ''Tan'' newspaper and later published as a book in 1955, titled ''Göl İnsanları'' (''People of The Lake''). Again in 1955, he became well-known with his novel ''Sağırdere'' (''Deaf River'').
''Esir Şehrin İnsanları'' (People of the Captive City), first of his city novels that he took İstanbul as a frame to observe Turks' transition from Ottoman Empire to the Republic, was published in 1956. İn this novel, Tahir described İstanbul under occupation after the
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...
. Sequels to this novel, ''Esir Şehrin Mahpusu'' (''Prisoner of the Captive City'') was published in 1961 and Yol Ayrımı (''Parting of the Ways'') in 1971.
At first, Kemal Tahir focused on problems of peasants. Then, he dealt with Turkish history, especially events of recent history. In his novel ''Devlet Ana'' (''Mother State'') he described governmental and social structure of Ottoman society at its beginnings; in ''Kurt Kanunu'' (''Law of Wolf''), he narrates the İzmir assassination incident, which was a failed attempt to kill Atatürk; he analysed banditry phenomenon in ''Rahmet Yolları Kesti'' (''Rain Closed the Roads'') and "
ağa
Ağa is a Turkish surname. Notable people with the surname include:
*Mustapha Aga, Ottoman Empire ambassador to the Swedish Court
* Osman Aga of Temesvar, Ottoman army officer
*Sedefkar Mehmed Agha, Ottoman architect of the Sultan Ahmed Mosque
* S ...
" system in ''Yedi Çınar Yaylası'' (''Seven Plane Tree Plateau''). İn his historical novel ''Yorgun Savaşçı'' (''Tired Warrior''), Tahir narrates the period that the national resistance forces in Anatolia without a leader came together and started the
Turkish Independence War
The Turkish War of Independence "War of Liberation", also known figuratively as ''İstiklâl Harbi'' "Independence War" or ''Millî Mücadele'' "National Struggle" (19 May 1919 – 24 July 1923) was a series of military campaigns waged by th ...
.
Because of financial difficulties, Kemal Tahir wrote pulp fiction novels under pseudonyms. He also translated '' Mike Hammer'' novels and even wrote original new novels for that series.
Some of his novels (like ''Karılar Koğuşu'', ''Haremde Dört Kadın'', ''Esir Şehrin İnsanları'' and ''Kurt Kanunu'') later adapted into movies.
Complete list of fiction
* Göl İnsanları (stories) (1955)
* Sağırdere (1955)
* Esir Şehrin İnsanları (1956)
* Körduman (1957)
* Rahmet Yolları Kesti (1957)
* Yedi Çınar Yaylası (1958)
* Köyün Kamburu (1959)
* Esir Şehrin Mahpusu (1961)
* Bozkırdaki Çekirdek (1962)
* Kelleci Memet (1962)
* Yorgun Savaşçı (1965)
* Devlet Ana (1967)
* Kurt Kanunu (1969)
* Büyük Mal (1970)
* Yol Ayrımı (1971)
* Namusçular (1974)
* Karılar Koğuşu (1974)
* Hür Şehrin İnsanları (1976)
* Damağası (1977)
* Bir Mülkiyet Kalesi (1977)