Nâzım Hikmet

Nazım Hikmet Ran

Template:History of Turkish LiteratureNazım Hikmet Ran (IPA:nɑ'zɯm hik'met) (November 20, 1901 – June 3, 1963) is widely regarded as the best-known Turkish poet. A dramatist and communist, his works have been translated into several languages. Nazım Hikmet is sometimes called "Turkey's national poet." He was born in Selânik in the Ottoman Empire (now Thessaloniki, Greece). Later he became member of the Communist Party of Turkey (TKP) and died in exile in Moscow.

Style and achievements

Despite writing his first poems in syllabic meter, Nazım Hikmet distinguished from the "syllabic poets" in concept. With the development of his poetic conception, the narrow forms of the syllabic meter began not to satisfy his needs and he set out to seek new forms for his poems. During the first years (1922-1925) of living in the Soviet Union, this search for form reached the peak.

Breaking the boundaries of the syllabic meter, he changed his form and preferred writing in free verse which harmonised with the rich vocal properties of the Turkish language. He was affected by Mayakovski and the young Soviet poets who advocated Futurism. Many of his poems have been composed by Zülfü Livaneli. A part of his work have been translated in Greek language by poet Yiannis Ritsos, and some of these translations have been composed by the Greek composers Manos Loizos and Thanos Mikroutsikos.

Death and afterward

He died of a heart attack in Moscow after many years in exile from his native Turkey. He is buried in the famous cemetery of Novodeviche in Moscow and his imposing tombstone is even today a place for pilgrimage by Turks and communists from around the world.

Some of his best known works

• Memleketimden İnsan Manzaraları (Human Landscapes from My Country)
• Taranta-Babu'ya Mektuplar (Letters to Taranta-Babu)
• Ferhad ile Şirin (Ferhad and Şirin)
• Kurtuluş Savaşı Destanı (The Epic Of The War Of Independence)
• Şeyh Bedrettin Destanı (The Epic of Sheikh Bedreddin)

• Kafatası (The Skull)
• Unutulan Adam (The Forgotten Man)

Kız Çocuğu

Nazım's poem Kız Çocuğu (The Little Girl) conveys a plea for peace from a seven-year-old girl ten years after she has perished in the atomic bomb attack at Hiroshima. It has achieved popularity as an anti-war message and has been performed as a song by a number of singers and musicians.

Zülfü Livaneli (on Nazım Türküsü) has performed a version of the original Turkish poem. A loose English translation of Kız Çocuğu known as I Come And Stand At Every Door has been performed by The Byrds (on the album Fifth Dimension), Pete Seeger (on the album Headlines & Footnotes), and This Mortal Coil (on the album Blood), and many others including most oddly, The Fall on their 1997 album Levitate albeit omitting the last verse and wrongly attributing writing credits to anon/J Nagle. In 2005, famed Shima-Uta singer Chitose Hajime collaborated with Ryuichi Sakamoto by translating Kız Çocuğu into Japanese (retitled 'Shinda Onna no Ko' [死んだ女の子]). It was performed live at the Atomic Bomb Dome in Hiroshima on the eve of the 60th Anniversary (August the 5th, 2005). The song later appeared as a bonus track on Chitose's Hanadairo album in 2006.

Poems

This world will grow cold,

a star among stars,

one of the smallest,

this great world of ours

a gilded mote on blue velvet.

This world will grow cold one day,

not even as a heap of ice,

or a lifeless cloud,

it will roll like an empty walnut round and round

in pitch darkness for ever.

For now you must feel this pain,

and endure the sadness,

but so loved this world

that you can say,

'I have lived'.

February 1948
[Letters to Kemal Tahir from Prison]
Source: Beyond the Walls: Selected Poems by Nazim Hikmet, Richard McKane, and Ruth Christie

Invitation

Nazım Hikmet's Davet ("Invitation") is one of his most known poems. Nazım tells what he wants, what would or must life be like, in the poem's last lines about living like "a tree" and "forest".

Davet	Invitation
Dörtnala gelip Uzak Asya'dan	Galloping from Far Asia and jutting out
Akdeniz'e bir kısrak başı gibi uzanan	into the Mediterranean like a mare's head
bu memleket bizim.	this country is ours.
Bilekler kan içinde, dişler kenetli, ayaklar çıplak	Wrists in blood, teeth clenched, feet bare
ve ipek bir halıya benziyen toprak,	and this soil spreading like a silk carpet,
bu cehennem, bu cennet bizim.	this hell, this paradise is ours.
Kapansın el kapıları, bir daha açılmasın,	Shut the gates of plutocracy, don't let them open again,
yok edin insanın insana kulluğunu,	annihilate man's servitude to man,
bu dâvet bizim.	this invitation is ours.
Yaşamak bir ağaç gibi tek ve hür	To live like a tree single and at liberty
ve bir orman gibi kardeşçesine,	and brotherly like the trees of a forest,
bu hasret bizim.	this yearning is ours.

Nazım Hikmet (1902-1963)

In popular culture

• Tale of Tales is a Russian film partially inspired by Hikmet's poem of the same name
• Mavi Gözlü Dev (meaning "Blue eyed giant") is a 2007 Turkish biographical film about Nazım Hikmet. He is portrayed by actor Yetkin Dikinciler.

External links

• Nâzım Hikmet Ran Poet du monde ;
• N.Hikmet reading his poem Kerem Gibi
• Nâzım Hikmet; a fine collection of poems, reflections, photographs, etc. In Turkish and English.
• Zülfü Livaneli; more information on Zülfü Livaneli.
• Artists come up against the ban of Nazim Hikmet from soL the online newspaper.
• http://nazimusta.com/