Zeynep Nihal Yeğinobalı (16 November 1927 - 14 March 2020) was a Turkish novelist and translator.

Private life

Zeynep Nihal was born in

Manisa Manisa () is a city in Turkey's Aegean Region and the administrative seat of Manisa Province, lying approximately 40 km northeast of the major city of İzmir. The city forms the urban part of the districts Şehzadeler and Yunusemre, with ...

on 16 November 1927. She moved to

Istanbul Istanbul is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, largest city in Turkey, constituting the country's economic, cultural, and historical heart. With Demographics of Istanbul, a population over , it is home to 18% of the Demographics ...

when she was eight years old. Following the primary school, she attended

American College for Girls The American Robert College of Istanbul ( or ), often abbreviated as Robert or RC, is a highly selective, independent, co-educational, private high school in Turkey. The school is situated in a wooded campus on the European side of Istanbul in ...

(ACG45), and upon graduation in 1945, went to the United States to study literature in the

State University of New York The State University of New York (SUNY ) is a system of Public education, public colleges and universities in the New York (state), State of New York. It is one of the List of largest universities and university networks by enrollment, larges ...

. After living eight years in the United States, she returned to Turkey. Yeğinobalı died in

at the age of 92 on 14 March 2020.

Career

She used the

pen name A pen name or nom-de-plume is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name. A pen name may be used to make the author's na ...

s "Süreyya Sarıca" and"Vincent Ewing". She was a young woman when she published her first translation of the 1904 novel '' The Garden of Allah'' by Robert Hichens (1864-1950) into ''Allah’ın Bahçesi'' in 1946, and her first novel ''Genç Kızlar'' ("Young Girls") in 1950, which was an example of fictitious translation by her pen name "Vincent Ewing". She translated many classical and contemporary works of writers, including

Laurence Sterne Laurence Sterne (24 November 1713 – 18 March 1768) was an Anglo-Irish novelist and Anglican cleric. He is best known for his comic novels ''The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman'' (1759–1767) and ''A Sentimental Journey Thro ...

(713–1768),

Jane Austen Jane Austen ( ; 16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist known primarily for #List of works, her six novels, which implicitly interpret, critique, and comment on the English landed gentry at the end of the 18th century ...

(1775–1817),

Charlotte Brontë Charlotte Nicholls (; 21 April 1816 – 31 March 1855), commonly known as Charlotte Brontë (, commonly ), was an English novelist and poet, the eldest of the three Brontë family, Brontë sisters who survived into adulthood and whose novel ...

(1816–1855), W.M. Thackeray (1811–1863),

Charles Dickens Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English novelist, journalist, short story writer and Social criticism, social critic. He created some of literature's best-known fictional characters, and is regarded by ...

(1812–1870),

Thomas Hardy Thomas Hardy (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928) was an English novelist and poet. A Literary realism, Victorian realist in the tradition of George Eliot, he was influenced both in his novels and in his poetry by Romanticism, including the poetry ...

(1840–1928),

Lewis Carroll Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (27 January 1832 – 14 January 1898), better known by his pen name Lewis Carroll, was an English author, poet, mathematician, photographer and reluctant Anglicanism, Anglican deacon. His most notable works are ''Alice ...

(1832–1898),

Oscar Wilde Oscar Fingal O'Fflahertie Wills Wilde (16 October 185430 November 1900) was an Irish author, poet, and playwright. After writing in different literary styles throughout the 1880s, he became one of the most popular and influential playwright ...

,(1854–1900),

Mark Twain Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), known by the pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, and essayist. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has produced," with William Fau ...

(1835–1910),

J. M. Barrie Sir James Matthew Barrie, 1st Baronet, (; 9 May 1860 19 June 1937) was a Scottish novelist and playwright, best remembered as the creator of Peter Pan. He was born and educated in Scotland and then moved to London, where he wrote several succe ...

(1860–1937),

D. H. Lawrence David Herbert Lawrence (11 September 1885 – 2 March 1930) was an English novelist, short story writer, poet, playwright, literary critic, travel writer, essayist, and painter. His modernist works reflect on modernity, social alienation ...

(1885–1930),

L. Frank Baum Lyman Frank Baum (; May 15, 1856 – May 6, 1919) was an American author best known for his children's fantasy books, particularly '' The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'', part of a series. In addition to the 14 ''Oz'' books, Baum penned 41 other novels ...

(1856–1919),

John Steinbeck John Ernst Steinbeck ( ; February 27, 1902 – December 20, 1968) was an American writer. He won the 1962 Nobel Prize in Literature "for his realistic and imaginative writings, combining as they do sympathetic humor and keen social percep ...

(1902–1968), Pearl S. Buck (1892–1973),

Mikhail Sholokhov Mikhail Aleksandrovich Sholokhov ( rus, Михаил Александрович Шолохов, p=ˈʂoləxəf; – 21 February 1984) was a Russian novelist and winner of the 1965 Nobel Prize in Literature. He is known for writing about life ...

(905–1984),

Carlos Fuentes Carlos Fuentes Macías (; ; November 11, 1928 – May 15, 2012) was a Mexican novelist and essayist. Among his works are ''The Death of Artemio Cruz'' (1962), '' Aura'' (1962), '' Terra Nostra'' (1975), '' The Old Gringo'' (1985) and '' Christop ...

( 1928–2012),

Isabel Allende Isabel Angélica Allende Llona (; born 2 August 1942) is a Chilean-American writer. Allende, whose works sometimes contain aspects of the magical realism genre, is known for novels such as '' The House of the Spirits'' (''La casa de los espír ...

(born 1942),

Eduardo Galeano Eduardo Germán María Hughes Galeano (; 3 September 1940 – 13 April 2015) was a Uruguayan journalist, writer and novelist considered, among other things, "a literary giant of the Latin American left" and "global soccer's pre-eminent man of le ...

(1940–2015),

Patrick White Patrick Victor Martindale White (28 May 1912 – 30 September 1990) was an Australian novelist and playwright who explored themes of religious experience, personal identity and the conflict between visionary individuals and a materialistic, co ...

(1912–1990),

Iris Murdoch Dame Jean Iris Murdoch ( ; 15 July 1919 – 8 February 1999) was an Irish and British novelist and philosopher. Murdoch is best known for her novels about good and evil, sexual relationships, morality, and the power of the unconscious. Her fi ...

(1919–1999) and

D. M. Thomas Donald Michael Thomas (25 January 1935 – 26 March 2023) was a British poet, translator, novelist, editor, biographer and playwright. His work has been translated into 30 languages. Working primarily as a poet throughout the 1960s and 1970s, ...

(born 1935). Her writings and translations were also published in periodicals like ''Hafta'', ''100 Roman'', ''Yıldız'', '' Hayat'' and '' Akbaba''. She must have been a forceful personality —not many girls of her age would have been able to talk a publishing company into printing her translation of a new and exciting book by an American writer, a writer, who never existed. Yeginobali, a keen young writer at the time, wanted to write a novel about life at a girls’ college, but was tired of being turned down by publishing companies, which kept telling her that she was too young to be a writer. She also felt that the eroticism in her writing might be an overdose for readers of the time, especially coming from a young woman like herself. Aware that translated novels were much more in demand than work by new Turkish writers, she plotted, and convinced a publishing company to expect a chapter of translation (!) from Vincent Ewing’s book each week. The book hit the bestseller list in no time. Though Yeğinobalı was initially planning to reveal her identity, after the book came out to so much attention, she decided to keep at her game, and enjoy the commentaries from her hidden corner. Finally, in 2004, to coincide with a reprint of the novel by Can Publishing, Yeğinobalı decided that the time had come to add on her own name next to that of Vincent Ewing’s. The book’s new issue is among the publisher’s bestseller novels. She recently wrote her memoirs, ''Cumhuriyet Çocuğu'' ("The Republic’s Child"), published by Can Yayınları in 2005. Spanning the first ten years of her life, Yeğinobalı’s memoirs provide the reader with a vivid picture of life in a small

Anatolia Anatolia (), also known as Asia Minor, is a peninsula in West Asia that makes up the majority of the land area of Turkey. It is the westernmost protrusion of Asia and is geographically bounded by the Mediterranean Sea to the south, the Aegean ...

n town during the very first years of the Republic. Filmmakers are currently interested in her two other novels ''Mazi Kalbimde bir Yaradır'' (1988), and ''Sitem'' (1998), which suggest subtle readings of suppressed sexuality in Turkish society.

Works

Own works

Her major works are: ;Novels # # ''Eflatun Kız'' 1964 (Novel) # # # # # ;Memoirs *

Translations

Some of her translations are: # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # #

References

Sources

* "Graduates in the News." RC Quarterly 23 (2004): 18. * "Nihal Yeğinobalı." Imge Kitapevi. 2004. 9 May 200

{{DEFAULTSORT:Yeginobali, Nihal 1927 births 2020 deaths People from Manisa Alumni of Arnavutköy American High School for Girls State University of New York alumni Turkish translators Turkish women novelists Turkish women memoirists