Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 19.djvu/656

* TTTEKISH LANGUAGE. 566 TURKISH LANGUAGE. period, that Arabic words must be brought into Turkish with all their grammatical rules and appurtenances. The effect is to make the finest Turkish literature of this period a mere mass of macaronies quite unintelligible to those who have not enough knowledge of Arabic and Persian to use dictionaries of those languages. Baki (died 1599), rated by Turkish critics as the 'king of the poets of Osmanli Turkish,' was a contem- porary of Saadeddin. He was the son of a mosque servant who became one of the Cazi- askers, or judges of the Supreme Court, under Sultan Selim II. His poetry was strongly Per- sian in Havor, but without slavish imitation. Another great poet of this time was Fuzuli (died 15G3), whose real name was llehmed, of IJagdad. To a foreign taste he offers more of originality than Baki. His poems are warm with the peculiar fire of Sufiism, and in both poetry and prose he loved the strong virile Turkish words. The list of Turkish poets is long, but those mentioned are still the greatest names. To them we may add at some distance Xedim (died 1725), who was buffoon to Sultan Achmet III. The name of Kiani, whose real name was Abu Bckr (died 1791), too, should have a place in the list of notable poets of this period. The sim- plicity and transparent beauty of his lines are such that had it not been for his inveterate wag- gishness lie would hold very high rank among the Turkish poets. Another of the great poets of this period was Nabi (died 1712), whose Ghaxels are accounted among the finest. His real name was Yusuf of Urfa. One of his longer poems, the Khairii/e, has been translated into French by Pavet de Courteille. We may also mention the poetess Sherif Hanum, who died in 1809, leaving a Divan of some merit. The historians of the middle period make a long list. But their work is blemished, as a rule, by a difficult, stilted style, and the pettiness of the annalist. Among exceptions in the long series we may select Pechevi Ibrahim, who shows some inkling of what a historian should be ; Solak Zade, who died about 1680, and wrote in the graphic st3ie of an eye-witness; and espe- cially Katib Tslielebi, sometimes called Hajji Klialfah (q.v, ). His real name was Mustafa, and he died in 1G58, leaving an enormous mass of cx- tremelj' valuable writings in history, geography, and bibliography. To the same period probably belong certain writings of value which are passed over in scorn by the Turkish literary critics because they are not in the mongrel language of the pedants. Hence their authors are unknown. Of this class is the History of the Forty Viziers, dedicated to Sultan Mustapha I. ( 1617-23 ). It is a cycle of some seventy-five stories grouped about an incident of the Joseph and Potiphar order. The book is directed against the idea of trusting the fair sex and winds up, after all wrongs have been righted, with the quaint prayer, "May the Most High bring us all near to the good and to God, and keep us from the tricks of deceitful woman. Amen." Another of these unconsidered classics of Turkish is the Life of Nasr-eddin Hoja, a col- lection of bulls acted or spoken by a Turk of Asia Minor, who is delightfully humorous. To the same class belongs the stor.y of Shah lliran, a collection of fairy-tales, religious in purpose, which is remarkable for its pure Turkish diction. As a fruit of the Crimean War a revolution- took place in the educational system of Turkey. The result has been the appearance of the mod- ern school of writers who are yet to change en- tirely the character of Turkish literature. The heavy scholastic theologians are seeking to arrest the movement by the censorship, and they have persecuted or imprisoned some of the most pow- erful writers, like Ebuzzia Tewfik, or sent them to die in e.xile on a barren island like Kemel Bey. The aim of the new school of writers is to free the Turkish langiuige from the incubus of Arabic grammatical purism. The writers wlio have perhaps done the most toward accomplishing this object are Ahmed Vefik Pasha (died 1893), whose dictionary of Turkish in two volumes was a revelation to multitudes, and Ahmed Mithad Effendi, noted for his novels, essays, and his- torical studies. Great as is the lingaiistic value of Ahmed Mithad's writings, they are too close imitations of French works to have permanent literary value. Of far greater weight was Kemal Bey, who died in 1878. Jevdet Pasha, illustrious as an historian, whose works show a steady de- velopment toward the simpler Turkish style ; Zia Pasha, a brilliant essayist and poet; and Jevad Pasha, who has written a fine history of the origins of the Turkish military organization, are other examples of this school. Other notable names of this period are JIuallim Naji, poet and essayist; Ebuzzia Tewfik, literary critic; Sezayi Bey, Hussein Rahmi, Ahmed Easim, and Aliyfe Hanum, daughter of the historian .Tevdet Pasha, all of whom are novelists, dealing with current life in a realistic style entirely new in Turkish literature. The modern period cannot be said to have entirely revealed its qualities while strife with reactionist control continues. But it has at least shown that there is a future before the writers of Turkey, if they ever have freedom to speak and to develop. BiBLiOGR.A,PHT. For analysis of the philosophy of Turkish grammar, consult: Shaw, Sketch of the Turkish Language as Spoken in Eastern Tur- kestan (Calcutta, 1878-80) : for the Eastern Turk- ish language, De Courteille, Dietionmiire lure- oriental (Paris, 1870); Vambery, Cagataische Sprachstudien (Leipzig, 1867) ; Eadloff, Die alt- t^irkischen Insehriften der Mongolei ( Saint Peters- burg, 1897) ; id., Proben der Volkslitteratiir der tUrkischcn Stumme Sild-Sibericns (ib., 1868) ; Biihtlingk, Veher die Spraehe der Jakuten (ib., 1851). For the Ottoman Turkish language, con- sult: ^^'ells, Practical Orammar of the Turkish Language (London, 1880); Wahrmund, Prak- tisches Handbuch der osmanisch-tiirkischen Spraehe (2d ed., Giessen, 1885) ; August Miiller, "Tiirkische Grammatik," in the Porta Linguannn OrientaHum (Berlin. 1889) ; Youssouf. Gram- maire complete de la langue ottomane (Constan- tinople, 1892) : Redhouse, Lexicon, of the Otto- man Turkish Language (Constantinople. 1884), the most complete Turkish lexicon in existence ; id., English-Turkish Dictionary (ib., 1861) ; Sami. Dictionnaire turc-franrais. frnnenis-ture (Constantinople, 1883), is a small but very use- ful work. For Turkish literature, consult: Jacob. Tiirkische Litteratnrgeschichtc in Einzel- darstellungen (Berlin, 1900 et seq.) ; id., Tiirk- ische Volkslitteratiir (ib.. 1901): Gibb. History of Ottoman Poetry (London. 1902) : Hammer- Purgstall, Geschichte der ostnanischen Dicht-