“It will pass.”
“But behave yourself… Don’t serenade everywhere.”
I laughed. Sait was introducing me to those gathered.
“Muslihiddin Bey, one of the most enlightened of Ottoman intellectuals…”
I was greeting them all separately. Anyway, there were only six I didn’t know and was seeing for the first time.
“Salihü’l-ayni Efendi…” “Nikefor Koştanof Efendi” “Nikolaviç Efendi” “Mina Efendi” “Moiz Bori Efendi” “Casimü’l-Kürdi” “Louis Durant Bey…”
I shook all their hands. We stood very seriously. Sait was standing among us like a prophet, no not a prophet, like the ancient deity he anatomized in his poetry. He wore a light brown suit. The rest of ours were all black. He had written a long poem about our society’s future success, the humanitarian work it would do. There is no pen in the Ottoman lands like Sait’s pen. His foremost virtue is throwing away Turkish words and abundantly using Arabic and Persian words, especially Arabic and Persian compounds and descriptive compounds that we call Ottomanism. Those savages who try to Turkify our “Ottoman language” under the name “New Language” are prejudiced against him. But fearing the Ottoman “Public Opinion” that is definitely in his favor, they cannot object. In fact, the titles of several of his poems are in French. In his two large “poetry collections,” he hasn’t let slip a single Turkish word even for medicine. He is such a strict Ottoman. He adapts Turkish words to Arabic and Persian recitation. This success is unique to him. Even the most capable of the Young Ottomans still haven’t been able to imitate him. He was reading his poem. This was music. He had used the meter “mef’ülü mefailü mefailü feülün” from Arabic, in which he wrote his most famous poems. First a night was being described. Snakes, scorpions, predatory animals, beasts were tearing people apart. As people fled, they were killing each other. A chaos, a commotion… No one knows anything… A blindness… Five or ten people escape from this unconscious tragedy of humanity, hide. Swords don’t fall on their heads, bayonets don’t pierce their bellies. Slowly they move away. They’re going to a sacred place. Surely the morning of this night will dawn. Toward the horizon, toward the hills where the moon of salvation will shine… When the sun rises, they’re deciding how they’ll save their fellow humans, how they’ll tell them they’re all brothers. As they climb the hill, the sun also rises, the mass of humanity remaining in the distance, running toward the light, see their silhouettes drawn against the horizon. They cry out. “Save us, save us”… Then those still standing as if within the rising sun, that is, we, sing a long salvation hymn:
Fade O night of winter solstice of fanaticism, the rising sun Will illuminate the darkness of religions and nations.
The people rush. They kiss our feet. They regret thinking each other enemies by not seeing each other in the darkness and begin to worship us. The sun rises. Light covers the entire universe. Such light, such daylight that it has no setting and no night.
I was swooning. I looked at the others; they didn’t understand very well. When the poem ended, applause began. We six Turkish-Ottomans were still clapping our hands. We congratulated Sait. Diyamandis was sitting next to me, he quietly said, “I didn’t understand the meaning of this.”
I asked.
“Why?”
“It’s not Turkish.”
“Of course it’s not Turkish.”
“It’s not French either.”
“Naturally.”
“It’s not Greek either.”
“Yes.”
“Then what is it?”
“Ottoman.”
And I gave an explanation. The Ottoman language was composed of many Arabic, Persian words, Arabic and Persian rules. Turkish was used very little in it. Only a few verbs… This was a mixed and artificial language. In no place in the world was there a nation that accepted the rules of three languages. This Ottoman language was still only a literature and writing language. The Turks in Turkiye hadn’t accepted it until now. Among themselves they always spoke Turkish, never used Arabic and Persian rules, even corrupted the compound terms that the government forcibly imposed. For example, first lieutenant, second lieutenant… They didn’t say lieutenant-first, lieutenant-second. The Tanzimatists hadn’t taught Ottoman to the people. But we would teach it. Our compounds would all be Arabic, Persian. We would make the plurals of our words according to Arabic, Persian rules.
Diyamandis asked, “Why should the rules be Arabic, Persian?”
I laughed.
“Well, should they be Turkish?”
“No, let them be Greek…”
And he began to explain the facility of Greek, its historical value, Homer’s genius, the knowledge of ancient philosophers. Nikefor Koştanof was listening to us. He joined the conversation.
“Rules for Ottoman should be taken from Bulgarian. Bulgarian rules are both simple and perfect. Words are alive and meanings are fixed. It makes Ottoman solid as stone.”
Diyamandis objected: “It’s not a refined language.”
“But it can be refined.”
Ah Moiz Bori… This cheerful young man was apparently a Mason and a Metrist. I heard. He came to us laughing.
“You’re discussing the language matter, I suppose?” he said.
“Yes, we said, please join us…”
“Of course, after forming our club, we’ll discuss this at length. In my opinion, rather than making a new language or accepting a made one, it’s more logical and appropriate to revive an old and now unspoken language.”
Diyamandis hurried: “For example, Greek…”
“No, Hebrew…”
The servant came. “Dinner is ready,” he said. Sait’s dining room is more perfect than his salon. A prince friend of his wife had gifted dining and silver sets worth four hundred liras in half an hour. The table was decorated with white greenhouse lilacs. However, this is not fashionable. But Necdet and his wife are very fantasist in this matter. They don’t look at fashion or custom at all. They make arrangements on their own. Louis Durant Bey had fallen next to me. We both ate and talked. He’s truly a valuable man. His grandfather’s father was apparently from Normandy. Their houses still stand in France. His mother’s father was Greek, his mother Italian. He married an Armenian Catholic girl. He worked for a long time in embassy clerkships, chief consulships. Now, that is, after the Constitution, he’s aggrieved… He said that although he knows Greek, German, English, Italian, Spanish, Russian, French, Armenian perfectly, he still hasn’t been able to learn to read and write Turkish.
“Turkish is very crude, very savage, very tasteless!” he said, “Please don’t be offended that I say so…”
“Absolutely not, on the contrary, I’m pleased.”
“Aren’t you Turkish?”
“No, I’m not Turkish.”
“What are you?”
“Ottoman…”
He looked at my face strangely. Then he began to praise Latin. For Ottomans, no institution could be found as sublime as this forgotten language. If we could get the Ottomans to accept old Latin as a language, the East would then see civilization. In the world, apparently only the Levantines could be considered pure Latin.
As Louis Durant Bey was reading me some Latin philosophical poems and translating them into French, we saw Doctor Eserullah Natık stand up. He was going to give a speech. He smiled. He joked with those next to him and began. First he congratulated us for gathering for such a great idea. Then he said, “A German philosopher whose name I don’t remember says that for the idea of common and brotherly humanity to be born and become reality, nations must abandon armament. We Germans are crude. We cannot do this first. However, the French… These are the most refined, most intelligent nation in the world. Every kind of revolution has shone from them. Let them make the sacrifice. Let them disperse their armies first. Other nations will follow suit, he says; however, I claim that neither the French, nor the Germans, nor the English, no nation will make this sacrifice. The Ottomans, mixed up, melted, united, will do this,” he said and continued. Because Turkiye was the most suitable ground for this. The Turks, whom Europeans still imagine exist in Turkiye, had separated so much from their old nationality and language that a Turk coming from Turan could never look at them as “blood brother!” He prolonged it, prolonged it. He thoroughly disparaged the Turks. He told all about himself, that he dealt with morphology, that he even played the tambura, that he was a troubadour, his dervishhood, everything. He talked about the six hundred thousand-page works he had written and was about to write.
Nikolaviç Efendi said, “Let there be no mistake in the number…” This was a yellow-haired, tall, louse-faced, blue-eyed Slav… He didn’t know that Natık had read three million books until now. He was saying “bigger than an encyclopedia,” calculating that a printing house that could print such an enormous work couldn’t be found in Turkiye. Sadullah Behçet swore that the Doctor was telling the truth. Hasan Rudi said he had seen these written books with his eyes. Not only Nikolaviç, we all believed. Perhaps even Natık himself… After that, the word was taken by Nutki Zeki. Here’s someone who surpasses me in oratory. I must confess my inadequacy. He knows French as well as Turkish. He spent an important part of his life in Europe. Although ugly and unpleasant, he’s so chic that… They even say a princess fell in love with him in Egypt. When he was managing a Cafe Chantant in Europe, he also worked as an actor. His gestures are tremendous. He still works for an hour every morning in front of the full-length mirror. He even practices saying “Bonjour, bonsoir.” Being a law specialist, he harped on how the laws of the new “Ottoman” nation should be. He said the most perfect, most sublime laws in the world were the laws of the black Liberian government in Africa. After that, Casimü’l-Kürdi, Moiz Bori, Savsaklıyan, Fraşerli Nadir, Diyamandis, Salihü’l-ayni, Sadullah Behçet, Celal Mün’im, Koştanof, Hasan Rudi, Nikolaviç spoke in order. They all applauded common humanity and were repeating that they were sure of our success. We were getting up toward evening. We would all do “study” for fifteen days, prepare reports and plans regarding the formation of our club. As we went outside, Sait and Natık held me back. When we were alone, they said, “Your duty is to visit our new members,” “you’ll be in contact with them. You’ll instill our ideas in them before the formation of our club, you’ll prepare them.”
This was truly a difficult duty. Eserullah Natık had taken all their addresses, the numbers of the places where they lived, before I came. He extended me a small note. Our new friends were scattered like quail chicks all over Istanbul. The days they would be at their homes didn’t match each other at all. One said Friday, one Sunday, one Thursday was free.
“Ah doctor,” I said, “you’re not lazy about going out. And you’re strong too… Come on, take these visits upon yourself.”
He laughed. He shook his head and said: “Alas! I’m forty-eight years old, I must finish my work. I don’t have time [to go around].”
But isn’t it strange, night and day, whenever I went out in the street, I always ran into the doctor and involuntarily wondered when he wrote his six hundred thousand-page work.
The next day was Saturday. I said I’d start the visits from Moiz first and went out early. He was living in Balat. I didn’t have difficulty. They showed me his house. Extremely Western-style… They all spoke French at home. His wife was so fat that I estimated just one of her thighs would be twice Moiz’s size. I was afraid her corset would tear every time she breathed. But an enlightened woman… Her husband had explained our scientific and social enterprise to her. Very pleased and happy…
“Now Jews too will earn the right to live…” she was saying, rejoicing and asking me, “What do you think about Zionism?”
I couldn’t answer, I was looking at the yellow teeth visible from Moiz’s frozen smile. The woman continued.
“Just recently, your great philosopher Doctor Eserullah Natık gave a lecture to Jewish youth at our national school in Balat. At that time our youth asked what he thought about Zionism. Your friend shouted: ‘Indeed, I myself am a Zionist!’ Our newspapers published his sublime ideas for days under the headline ‘Doctor Natık is a Zionist’ in large letters. Didn’t you read it?”
“No.”
“Very strange…”
“Why?”
“I’m almost going to think you’re a Young Turk.”
Moiz was also laughing, joining the conversation. I was bothered by the noise of the children playing outside. The armchairs in the room where we sat were Moroccan and old. The walls were covered with oilcloth paper. There was only one large oil painting. This was the picture of a man who could be estimated to be forty, at most forty-five years old. I asked: “Who is this gentleman? Is he your father? Or your brother?”
The husband and wife opened their eyes as if I had said something very strange. Not only their eyes but also their mouths… The woman stood up, saying, “You don’t recognize who this is?”
I looked. I looked. Could it be the modernized picture of Moses… No. No… I’m looking and couldn’t liken it to anyone famous. I became shy. Looking down, I stammered.
“Excuse me, I couldn’t recognize him.”
Moiz said, “It’s truly regrettable,” “that someone like you who deals with philosophy and science, who tries to realize the ideal of universal ‘humanity’ under the name ‘Ottomanism,’ doesn’t recognize the author of ‘The Conventional Lies of Our Civilization’…”
The woman also rushed at the same time: “Not to recognize the great and philosopher president of the last Zionist Congress… Regrettable… regrettable…”
“Is this Max Nordau?” I shouted and they stood up. I hadn’t seen the picture of this man whose works I’d read enough to memorize them. We were eating the candies brought by a thin, yellow, dirty servant girl. I told them the respect and admiration I had for him. I exaggerated so much that… Moiz found the courage to say, “We should bring him to the republic of the Ottoman nation and make him president…”
The woman’s mouth was so small it could almost be called the size of a barleycorn. Or it seemed so next to her large, fat body and her husband’s always open wide mouth. The words coming from there, those French words peculiar only to Jews, pleased me. I don’t know how long I sat. When I asked permission and went outside, like Doctor Eserullah Natık, I too had become a bit Zionist. But after melting the Ottomans and making them a new and contractual nation, this sweet dream would lose its meaning too.
All banks, embassies, financial institutions know Moiz. His relations with the government are also good. I had read in the newspapers that he was involved not only in mineral concessions but even in railroad schemes. Such an intelligence could render great services to the realization of our ideal.
The next day I got up earlier. It was Sunday and the weather was so beautiful that… One would think oneself in leafless gardens. I went up to Galata. Koştanof was living there, on Tower Street, in a large apartment. This man was a bachelor. He was living with a teacher from his relatives. As soon as he opened the door, he said, “We were waiting for you anyway.”
“How did you know I was coming?”
“Last night at Tokatlıyan I ran into Moiz Efendi. You told him.”
The reception rooms were not magnificent but rather very plain. He introduced me to his relative named Mademoiselle Magda Cakof. This girl resembled a Tatar. Her French was very weak. She didn’t know Turkish either. Koştanof translated a poem by Hristo Botef to me and was upset that although the French, Germans, Russians had translated this poet’s works into their languages, the Ottomans didn’t pay attention.
“But my dear,” I said, “his works aren’t poetry…”
“Then what?”
“Just… just…”
He talked a lot of nonsense to make me accept Hristo Botef’s genius. He tried to prove that war and struggle are the natural state in life, that calm and rest are contrary to nature. He ventured to claim without getting bored that all ideas of humanity were rotten. I very politely reminded him of our purpose. Our scientific and scholarly conviction, our enlightenment was extremely humane and far from struggle. I explained this so sweetly that he couldn’t object. Only he said, “What I said are the ideas of European philosophers…” “otherwise I too am a ‘humanist’ and I’m with you.”
I got up and shook his hand. He smiled. He mentioned the possibility of later being able to include all the Kingdom of Bulgaria in the “Ottoman” nation we would create by melting and mixing. When I left and went out to the street, I thought about how Koştanof lived. Perhaps he was rich. The Turkish rags published in Thessaloniki had written that this honorable and learned man had been a guerrilla for a long time and just last month had strangled a Vlach guerrilla leader who was his friend and thrown him in the water. Was it possible? That such a cultured man graduated from the Sorbonne should commit murder…
I couldn’t find Nikolaviç and Mina at their homes.
Ömer Seyfettin
