Turkish Theater Research Articles

The Albert Nekimken Turkish Theater Collection: Censorship, Contentious Politics, and the Cold War Stage

Turkish political theater of the 1960s-1970s was a genre that galvanized both its intellectual proponents and drew the ire of state authorities. Deeply marked by the work of Bertolt Brecht produced some half a century earlier, the stage became an important setting where the broader violence between far-left groups, far-right groups, and the government was recast in literary form. During his doctoral research on the influence of German Marxism on Turkish political theater, former U.S. Peace Corps volunteer Albert Nekimken collected plays, works of theatrical criticism, periodicals, short stories, novels, and rare recordings of performances, among other materials. The Albert Nekimken Turkish Theater Collection, primarily composed of Nekimken’s research materials, began to grow as playwrights, intellectuals, and others contributed interviews or gifted materials to the young scholar in the mid-to-late 1970s. These works were acquired by Nekimken at a time of rampant political censorship and ntellectual persecution–exemplified by the fact that many of the publications and performances in the collection were banned or subject to great censorship by the Turkish government. Among the works in the collection are those by well-known writers such as Orhan Asena, Engin Cezzar, Güngör Dilmen, Muhsin Ertuğrul, Nâzım Hikmet, Orhan Kemal, Aziz Nesin, and Haldun Taner. This newly described and processed collection held in the Booth Family Center for Special Collections at Georgetown University offers new directions to students and scholars of political theater, the history of Modern Turkey, Turkish-German literary exchanges, and intellectual histories of the Cold War. The collection also gives educators hoping to bring primary sources into the classroom new pedagogical tools to explore histories of censorship, erasure, and contentious politics.

Jubilees and Jubilee Booklets in Modern Turkish Theatre around the Concept of First

Modern anlamda ulusal bir tiyatro meydana getirme gayretlerinin en önemli halkalarından birini, tiyatromuzda vücut bulan jübileler etrafında oluşturulan jübile kitapçıkları geleneği oluşturur. Bu gelenek, tarihselliğinin ve sürekliliğinin yanında oluşturduğu bilgi birikimiyle de dikkate değer bir külliyat meydana getirmektedir. Jübile kavramının altında oluşan jübile kitapçıkları, Türk tiyatrosunda ilk olarak Mardiros Mınakyan adına tertip edilmiş böylece tiyatro tarihimizin jübile ve jübile kitapçığının miladı olarak karşımıza çıkmıştır. Muhsin Ertuğrul’un 1927’de Darülbedayi rejisörlüğüne atanmasından sonra jübilesi yapılan çoğu sanatçı için bir de jübile kitapçığı tanzim edilmeye başlanmıştır. İhtifalle, jübile geleneğinin birbirinden farklılığının esasını da teşkil eden bu kitapçıklar, Darülbedayi ’den İstanbul Şehir Tiyatrolarına bir aktarım olarak geçmiş ve sürekliliğini oluşturmuştur. Jübilelerin ehemmiyetini kitapçıklara dercederek Türk tiyatro tarihinde jübilelerin kalıcı hale gelmesini sağlayan jübile kitapçığı geleneği Türk edebiyatına da modernize olmuş biyografi örnekleri diyebileceğimiz bu kitapçıkları bırakmıştır. Çalışmamızın esasını Türk tiyatrosunda jübile ve bu geleneğin eseri olan jübile kitapçıkların hem Türk edebiyatı hem Türk tiyatrosu tarihi açısından incelenmesi oluşturmaktadır.

Ideology and Theatre Translation in Contemporary Turkish Theatre

This paper aims to explore the relationship between drama translation and ideology in contemporary Turkish theatre. After delineating the distinction between state/city theatres and independent (private/alternative) theatres, it will then focus on the 2000s with a special emphasis on the translation activities of independent (private/alternative) theatres. In particular, it shall draw attention to how actor/director translators working with or for these theatres have become significant cultural agents and have challenged the status quo by either choosing to translate plays with provocative content or by retranslating plays that were forced to undergo (self-)censorship. The paper will also challenge the general impression in the Turkish context that the reason for retranslating classical plays into Turkish is merely a need to follow and reflect contemporary changes in the language.

Director-Focused Identity Problematic in Turkish Theater in the Republican Era

Türk Tiyatrosu denilince akıllara ilk olarak geleneksel Türk tiyatrosu gelmektedir. Çünkü geleneksel Türk tiyatrosunun geçmişi yüzyılları bulmaktadır. Çağdaş tiyatronun ya da diğer batı formundaki tiyatronun geçmişi yaklaşık yüz yıl kadardır. Buna rağmen geçen yüz yıl içerisinde batı formundaki tiyatro kökleşerek ve gelişimini sürdürerek yerleşik tiyatro formuna dönüşmüştür. Artık Türk tiyatrosu denildiğinde akıllara gelen bir tiyatro biçimi haline gelmeye başlamıştır. Geleneksel tiyatro örneklerinin yok denecek kadar az olması bu durumun önünü açtığı varsayılmaktadır. 
 Tiyatro tarihi incelendiğinde tiyatro için en önemli gelişmelerden birisi yönetmenliğin tiyatro alanında keşfedilmesidir. Yönetmenliğin keşfi ile tiyatro kısa süre içerisinde yapılan farklı biçim denemeleri, avangart girişimlerle büyük gelişim göstermiştir. Batı tiyatrosu geçmişi binlerce yılı bulan ve bu sürede oluşturduğu formu üzerine yönetmenliği keşfederek yenilikler katmıştır. Bu durum Türk tiyatrosu için geçerli değildir. Türk tiyatrosu ise kökeni yüzlerce yıl geriye dayanan geleneksel tiyatro örnekleriyle temsiller verirken ülkedeki değişen felsefi ve siyasi ortam sebebiyle yeni bir biçime yönelmiştir. Yönetmen tiyatrosunun konuşulduğu bir zaman diliminde gerçekleşen bu değişim bir kimlik sorunsalı ortaya çıkartmıştır. Bu kimlik sorunsalını bir düzleme getirmesi ve tiyatronun evrensel standartlarda temsiller verebilmesi uzun yıllar almıştır. 
 Türkiye’de televizyonlarda yapılan tiyatro benzeri eğlence programları yüksek reytingler alarak büyük rağbet görmektedir. Yapısal olarak incelendiği zaman bu eğlence programlarının geleneksel tiyatro örnekleriyle benzeştiği görülmektedir. Cumhuriyet dönemi Türk tiyatrosunda yaşanan yönetmen odaklı kimlik sorunsalı sonrası yok olmak üzere olan geleneksel tiyatro örnekleri hala güncelliğini ve işlevini korumaktadır. Bu bağlamda geleneksel tiyatronun kimlik sorunsalı içerisinde kültürden kopuşu ve tekrar kullanılabilirliği araştırılacaktır.

The Role and Effects of the Ottoman Sultans in the Formation of Modern Turkish Theatre: Inspiration, Construction and Revival

Tarihi çok eskilere dayanan Türk tiyatrosu temelde “geleneksel” ve “modern” olmak üzere ikiye ayrılmaktadır. Osmanlı’nın son yüzyılına kadar etkinliğini sürdüren geleneksel tiyatro kalıpları Avrupa ile kurulan temaslar akabinde yerlerini giderek Batı tarzı tiyatro anlayışına bırakmış, bu değişim “esin, inşa ve ihya” kavramlarıyla nitelenebilecek süreçler sonrasında gerçekleşmiştir. Osmanlı’nın 17. yüzyıl itibarıyla yürütmeye başladığı Batıyla temasa geçip ilişkileri geliştirme politikası III. Selim ve II. Mahmud dönemlerinde oldukça etkili bir hale gelmiş, Batı tarzı sanat ve tiyatro ile tanışıklık da gerçek anlamda ilk bu dönemlerde olmuştur. Bu noktada özellikle Avrupa’ya gönderilen elçilerin gözlem ve bilgi anekdotlarından oluşan Sefaretnamelerin oldukça etkili olduklarını söylemek gerekir. Batıyı tanıma ve bilme noktasında önemli işlevlere sahip olan bu sefaretnamelerin bir diğer özelliği de 19.yüzyılda inşa edilecek olan modern Türk tiyatrosunun kuruluşuna izlek ve esin kaynağı olmalarıdır. Kuşkusuz modern Türk tiyatrosu III. Selim ve II. Mahmud’un eğilimleri akabinde Batı tarzı sanatı tanıma, bilme ve esinlenme aşamalarını yaşamış, fakat inşa ve ihya süreçlerini “3A dönemi” olarak adlandırdığımız, padişahlar Abdülmecid, Abdülaziz ve Abdülhamid dönemlerinde gerçekleştirmiştir. Batı tarzı Türk tiyatrosunun inşasında üçlü sacayağı görevi yürüten sözü edilen padişahlar yenilikçi ve Batılılaşma yönünde ortaya koymuş oldukları irade ve yönetim anlayışı ile Türk tiyatrosundaki bu keskin makas değişiminin mimarları olmuşlar, katkı ve kazanımlarıyla modern Türk tiyatrosunun daha kuruluş aşamasında “altın çağ” yaşamasına yol açmışlardır. Batı tiyatrosu ile Geleneksel Türk tiyatrosu arasındaki iki temel fark bu dönemlerde giderilmiştir. Batı tiyatrosunun iki karakteristik yapısı söz konusudur. Biri metne dayalı olması diğeri de oyunların sahnede (tiyatro salonu) sergileniyor olmasıdır. Modern tiyatronun koşulu olan bu iki etmen üç padişahın döneminde etkin bir şekilde yerine getirilip hem metinli tiyatroya geçilmiş hem de tiyatro binaları yapılarak oyunların artık sahnelerde oynanması sağlanmıştı. Yanı sıra, modern Tük tiyatrosuna ait hemen tüm ilkler ve yenilikler bu dönemlerde gerçekleşti. Yine, saraydaki sahne sanatlarına ilişkin oluşumlar ile özel ve azınlıklara ait çok çeşitli tiyatro grupları bu dönemlerde ciddi saray desteği görmüş, padişahların ‘ihsanları’ sayesinde tiyatro yaşamlarını sürdürebilmişlerdi. Ayrıca Batı tarzı sahne gösterilerinin uluslararası ilişkilerin ve diplomasinin araçlarından biri olarak kullanılması ve bunun bir devlet kültürü haline gelmesi de sözü edilen padişahlar dönemine aittir. Hülasa, Türk tiyatrosunun modernleşmesine ve dram sanatına dönüşmesine ilişkin tarihsel veriler ve gerçeklikler ışığında yapılacak her türlü değerlendirme, kuşku yok ki, inşa ve ihya sürecinde padişahları başat özne olarak konumlandırmayı bilimsel bir gereklilik olarak dikkatlere sunacaktır.

The Limits of Cis Compassion: The sad trans experience and its others in contemporary Turkish theatre

In the last decade, dramatic literature and theatre productions about trans women have become a significant part of Turkey's alternative theatre scene. These performances, pioneered by trans women, have been both celebrated and appropriated, with cis theatre makers often reshaping them within melodramatic conventions. Since the political ramifications of these theatrical productions are intricately linked to their narrative styles and genres, the employment of melodramatic portrayals presents emergent challenges for trans individuals, thereby culminating in a nuanced ‘transploitation’ of their narratives. While the melodramatic representations tell the stories of trans women's suffering and often end with the main character's death, the playwrights, actors, and the rest of the cast are almost always cisgender. Despite their popularity as well as aesthetic, social, and political significance, these plays have received limited scholarly attention. Moreover, the limited scholarship and public debates on them tend to treat their affective politics uncritically and even celebrate it. In the context of Turkey's liberal identity politics, these plays about trans women appear to challenge cis-heteropatriarchal oppression but ultimately reinforce cisnormative perspectives. In contrast, one-actor plays by transfeminist performers and playwrights challenge these melodramas. Characterized by themes of hope and resistance, transfeminist performances offer a contrast to mainstream portrayals of trans experience. These plays challenge the prevalent sadness in mainstream narratives about trans women, offering more empowering and representative portrayals. This juxtaposition sheds light on how sadness facilitates the experience of compassion, which both legitimizes and limits the performances about trans women.

The Place of Narrative in Traditional Turkish Theater : The Example of Rural Chamber Plays

The Place of Narrative in Traditional Turkish Theater : The Example of Rural Chamber Plays

The study of the first epic Turkish theater play titled Keşanlı Ali Destanı in the context of cultural displacement

Bu çalışma, Haldun Taner’in ilk epik Türk tiyatro oyunu olarak kabul edilen Keşanlı Ali Destanı (1964) adlı eserini ve eserin The Ballad of Ali of Keshan (1967/1976) başlığını taşıyan İngilizce çevirisini kültürleraşırı aktarım ve çeviri süreçleri bağlamında ele almayı amaçlamaktadır. İlk kez 1964 yılında sahnelenen oyun, geleneksel seyirlik oyunlarına kattığı yenilikçi nitelikle Türk kültür dizgesinde bir tiyatro olayıdır. Eser, Brechtçi epik tiyatro ile kurduğu ilişkinin bir sonucu olarak kültürlerarası bir karşılaşmanın ürünü ve farklı dizgelerin bireşimi olarak nitelendirilmektedir. Oyun ayrıca dilden dile çevrilerek dünyanın birçok ülkesinde sahnelenmiş, dolayısıyla bir kez daha çok yönlü bir kültürleraşırı hareketin konusu olmuştur. Çalışmada öncelikle eserin konu olduğu yer değiştirme hareketi üzerinde durulmaktadır. Keşanlı Ali Destanı’nın çoğuldizgedeki konumunu tartışmak üzere Itamar Even-Zohar’ın Çoğuldizge Kuramı’na ve kültür repertuarı kavramına başvurulmaktadır. Eser ardından, epik tiyatro türünün Türk kültür dizgesindeki ilk örneği olması dolayısıyla göstergelerarası çeviri bağlamında ele alınmaktadır. Bunun sebebi, oyunun teatral gösterge dizgeleri arasında geçen bir dönüştürme [transmutation] işlemi sonucunda inşa edilmiş olmasıdır. Çalışmanın bir sonraki aşamasında, eserin farklı dillere çeviri macerası ve Nüvit Özdoğru tarafından yapılmış olan İngilizce çevirisi, erek metne eklenmiş olan Çevirmenin Notu kapsamında irdelenmektedir. Theo Hermans’ın çeviri anlatıda Çevirmen’in Sesi kavramının bir temsili olarak ele alınan bu yan metin kapsamında yapılan betimleyici çalışma, epik tiyatronun unsurlarını Türk kültür dizgesinin imkânlarıyla yorumlayarak bünyesine katan oyunun, ardından dillerarası çeviri yoluyla bu kez farklı bir kültürde konumlanarak geçirdiği dönüşümü Çevirmen’in Sesi’nin sunduğu bildiriler dâhilinde açığa çıkarmaktadır. Bu çok aşamalı inceleme sonucunda, Keşanlı Ali Destanı’nın kültürleraşırı yer değiştirme hareketi ve çok yönlü çeviri macerası gözler önüne serilmektedir.

ÇAĞDAŞ TÜRK OYUN YAZARLIĞINDA BİR DIŞLAMA PRATİĞİ OLARAK HOMOFOBİ

1960’larda Weinberg tarafından tanımlanan homofobi terimi psikoloji, sosyoloji ve hukuk alanlarında
 irdelenen bir meseledir. Günümüzde cinsiyete dayalı ayrımcılığın bir dışlama pratiği olarak tanımlanan
 homofobi, etkileri ve sonuçlarıyla farklı alanlarda incelendiği gibi tiyatro alanında da işlenmiş, bu bağlamdaki
 deneyimler, sonuçlar, ezilme ve dışlama pratikleri sahneye getirilmiştir. Avrupa ve Amerika tiyatrosunda
 homofobiyi ele alan oyunların izleri 1930’larda görülmeye başlar, ancak homofobiyi çarpıcı şekilde işleyen
 metinler için 1960’ları beklemek gerekir. Türk oyun yazarlığında ise homofobiyi işleyen oyunlara rastlamak
 ancak 2000 sonrasında mümkündür. Peki 2000 sonrası Türk tiyatrosunda homofobik tutum ve davranışlar
 hangi bağlamlarda nasıl işlenmiştir? Bu metinlerde homofobiye ilişkin tahakküm ve direnme pratikleri
 nelerdir? Çalışmamızın amacı bu soruları yanıtlayarak 2000 sonrası Türk oyun yazarlığında cinsiyete
 dayalı ayrımcılık ve homofobi temasının nasıl işlendiğini örneklerle sunmaktır. 2000 sonrasında yazılmış
 oyunlardan homofobiyi ele alma, sahnelenme ve yayınlanma kriterleri gözetilerek 12 oyun seçilmiştir.
 Oyunlar homofobinin teorik zemini bağlamında incelenmiş, konunun ele alınışı açısından Bireyin Kendisini
 Dışlaması, Heteronormativiteden Doğan Sosyal Dışlama ve Kamusal Alanlardan Dışlama şeklinde üç
 başlıkta kategorize edilebileceği görülmüştür. Sonuçta oyun yazarlarının homofobiyi aşılması gereken bir
 dışlama biçimi olarak gördükleri; bazı oyunlarda direnme stratejisi üretilirken, bazılarında kabullenici bir
 tutum sergilendiği görülmüştür. Direnme üreten yazarlardan bazılarının, homofobiyi komedi aracılığıyla,
 bazılarının ise trajik öğelerle aşmaya çalıştığı görülmüştür.

As a Comparative Literature Example of Gagauz and Turkish Theatre “Mumnar Saalık İçin” by Nikolay Baboglu and “Gözlerimi Kaparım Vazifemi Yaparım” by Haldun Taner

Nikolay Baboglu, Gagauz Edebiyatı’nın önemli isimlerinden biridir. Gagauz kültür ögelerini her fırsatta eserlerine yansıtmayı ihmal etmeyen Baboglu’nun tek tiyatro eseri “Mumnar Saalık İçin”dir (Mumlar Sağlık İçin). “Mumnar Saalık İçin” adlı eser ile Türk Edebiyatı’nın önemli tiyatro ve öykü yazarı Haldun Taner’in “Gözlerimi Kaparım Vazifemi Yaparım” adlı eseri, benzer şekilde işledikleri toplumsal eleştiriyle dikkat çekmektedirler. Toplumcu bakış açısıyla ele alınan her iki oyun izlekler, kişiler, zaman ve dekor / mekân ögeleri açısından ele alınarak incelemeye tabi tutulmuştur. Bu iki oyunda yanlış işleyen bürokrasi, savaş ve ahlaki değerlere bakış izlekleri öne çıkmaktadır. Oyunlarda zaman ve dekor / mekân tamamlayıcı unsur olmaktan öteye geçerek işlevsel olarak kullanılmıştır. Bu çalışmada Nikolay Baboglu’nun “Mumnar Saalık İçin” ve Haldun Taner’in “Gözlerimi Kaparım Vazifemi Yaparım” adlı eserleri karşılaştırmalı edebiyat bağlamında incelenmiştir.

Sermet Muhtar Alus ve Türk Tiyatrosu

After the Tanzimat, in the Ottoman society, the theater continued its traditional stage activities as well as the rapidly developed, text-based, sparkling games with western style plays and staging. Copyright stage plays were written and translated into classical and contemporary texts of western literature. NonMuslim artists wrote plays and cantons around their own cultures. The first Turkish theater in Western style was established in Gedikpasa with the name of the Ottoman Theater, but this structure was destroyed after the performance of the Cerkes Ozdenleri. Until the proclamation of the constitutional monarchy, the theater was dominated by tradition, but on the other hand it used the western technique. This shows that it has a hybrid structure. Ortaoyunu, Karagoz and tuluat tried to meet the need of modern theater for the censoring of western style theater. In this respect, the literature of the Turkish theater has been shaped by analyzing the texts written by the writers, rather than stage activities, but there is a very moving theater world especially in Istanbul. Sermet Muhtar Alus was the witness of this world. He wrote about Istanbul every day in the last twenty years of his life. Alus shows in his newspaper articles and novels that he witnessed the history of the Ottoman theater. His writings are more important than many studies on the history of the theatre. These texts are valuable thanks to the observations and comments. In this study, theater groups, figures and events reflected in Alus’s newspaper articles will be evaluated. Afterwards, the reflections of Turkish and non-Muslim artists on Alus’s writings, activities of foreign theater groups and theater, and the buildings where Karagoz and meddah performances were given will be mentioned. Stories and novels are twice as much as newspaper articles. They were therefore excluded from the article.

Brecht, Turkish Theater, and Turkish-German Literature: Reception, Adaptation, and Innovation after 1960.By Ela E. Gezen. Rochester, N.Y.: Camden House, 2018. xiii+159 pages. $85.00.

Brecht, Turkish Theater, and Turkish-German Literature: Reception, Adaptation, and Innovation after 1960.<i>By Ela E. Gezen. Rochester, N.Y.: Camden House, 2018. xiii</i>+<i>159 pages. $85.00.</i>

Ela E. Gezen. Brecht, Turkish Theater, and Turkish-German Literature. Reception, Adaptation, and Innovation after 1960. Camden House, 2018.

Ela E. Gezen. Brecht, Turkish Theater, and Turkish-German Literature. Reception, Adaptation, and Innovation after 1960. Camden House, 2018.

Brecht, Turkish Theater, and Turkish-German Literature: Reception, Adaptation, and Innovation after 1960 by Ela A. Gezen

Reviewed by: Brecht, Turkish Theater, and Turkish-German Literature: Reception, Adaptation, and Innovation after 1960 by Ela A. Gezen Steffen Kaupp Brecht, Turkish Theater, and Turkish-German Literature: Reception, Adaptation, and Innovation after 1960. By Ela A. Gezen. Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2018. Pp. xiii + 159. Cloth $85.00. ISBN 978-1640140240. Already Leslie Adelson in her pathbreaking book The Turkish Turn in Contemporary German Literature (2005) made a convincing case against the so-called "between-the-worlds" paradigm when analyzing the cultural interventions of Turkish German literature in German society. Many scholars since have taken up Adelson's charge by showing how these texts shape cultural discourses, rather than locating migrants outside or between worlds, such as Tom Cheesman (Novels of Turkish German Settlement, 2007), Venkat Mani (Cosmopolitical Claims, 2007), Ruth Mandel (Cosmopolitan Anxieties, 2008), and Yasemin Yildiz (Beyond the Mother Tongue, 2012) to name but a few. Ela Gezen's Brecht, Turkish Theater, and Turkish-German: Reception, Adaptation, and Innovation after 1960 presents an original, comprehensive, inclusive, and engaging contribution that highlights the interrelatedness of German and Turkish archives through the lens of Brechtian aesthetics and its importance for both Turkish theater as well as Turkish German literature. On the one hand, Gezen establishes Bertolt Brecht as a key figure in Turkey in the post-1960-coup era where his epic theater as a theory of engaged art offered young leftist intellectuals a foundation to link aesthetics and politics, allowing them to advocate for societal change once freedom of thought and freedom from censorship had become constitutionally guaranteed rights. On the other hand, and this is the most significant contribution, through both original archival research as well as close textual analyses, Gezen provides a new paradigm for considering Turkish German literature by moving beyond the consideration of labor migration as the foundational moment of Turkish German cultural interactions. Gezen turns to the Turkish archive in that she introduces the reception and adaptation of Brecht's conceptualization of the theatrical stage, and how the engagement with Brecht's work in and of itself must be understood as an intersection of the German and Turkish archives. By turning the attention to the Turkish archive, Gezen also expands the historical and geographical scope of what is typically understood to be Turkish German cultural production. Already in the introduction, Gezen connects this turn to the Turkish archive to larger cultural questions, in that she sees her paradigm as a rejection of the marginalization of Turkish culture within German society. That is, Gezen convincingly argues that by using the figure and oeuvre of Brecht, one can paint a picture of cultural inclusion that moves beyond the supposed incompatibility of German and Turkish culture. Ultimately, Gezen shows how transnational cultural practices are never unidirectional by showing how the Turkish and German archives are interconnected through the figure of Brecht, both shaping and being shaped by each other. [End Page 407] After a thought-provoking introduction that outlines the major theoretical and analytical interventions of the book, Brecht, Turkish Theater, and Turkish-German Literature is divided into three relatively short chapters. Chapter 1 presents a concise overview of the transformation of left-wing political culture in Turkey after the 1960 and 1971 military coups, and how Brecht's theoretical work on socially engaged theater offered these young revolutionaries a framework for using art to trigger real societal change. Rather than focusing exclusively on individual stagings of Brecht plays in Turkey, Gezen engages with Brecht's influence on the Turkish theater scene and political left more programmatically. By introducing key "Brechtians" in Turkey, such as Genco Erkal, Haldun Taner, and Vasif Öngören, the first chapter shows how Turkish dramatists did not merely stage Brecht's plays, but rather interpreted and adapted them in a collaborative effort for the sociopolitical agenda of their political contexts. This chapter is thus also very much a history of intercultural left-wing politics focusing on the links between aesthetic theory and political practice, as well as the exchange between national contexts and transitional politics. Gezen elaborates on this merging of the Turkish and German archives in her discussion of Haldun Taner's The Ballad of Ali of Keshan (1970) where...

Brecht, Turkish Theater, and Turkish-German Literature: Reception, Adaptation, and Innovation after 1960 by Ela Gezen

Reviewed by: Brecht, Turkish Theater, and Turkish-German Literature: Reception, Adaptation, and Innovation after 1960 by Ela Gezen Britta Kallin Ela Gezen. Brecht, Turkish Theater, and Turkish-German Literature: Reception, Adaptation, and Innovation after 1960. Camden House, 2018. 159 pp. Cloth, $85.00. This cohesive, well-written, and overdue analysis examines the interconnections and intersections of Brecht's political aesthetics, Turkish theater, and Turkish-German literature. Ela Gezen's methodological approach builds on intersectional scholarship in German studies such as Leslie Adelson's "Turkish turn" in German literature, B. Venkat Mani's "cos-mopolitical claims," and Fatima El-Tayeb's investigation into Germany's racist history that created "non-Germans/ Undeutsche" The first chapter covers the period after the military coup in Turkey in 1960 and explores how Turkish intellectuals were drawn to Brecht's approach to use theater as a political tool that supports working-class efforts to limit capitalist exploitation. The first translation of Brecht's works into Turkish was published in 1956. In 1964 the first theater department was established at a Turkish university. In the same year, the staging of Brecht's play The Good Person of Szechwan in a theater in Istanbul, Dram Tiyatro, was interrupted by protests. This was called the "Brecht Incident" and led to an investigation into the play's communist message. During that time Turkish theater practitioners started referring to plays as "ex-periments" and troupes as "ensembles" to underline the experimental aspects of theater. Brecht's epic theater and Verfremdung became part of many Turkish plays, such as Haldun Taner's The Ballad of Ali of Keshan. Taner uses culture as a weapon to counteract suppressive governmental strategies. In the 1960s, international theater festivals such as the one in Erlangen, Germany, allowed Turkish student groups to perform, interact, and exchange ideas about Brecht's aesthetics. This exchange was mediated through new Brecht translations and synopses of plays in Turkish, English, and German that were available at the festivals. In the second chapter, Gezen explores the writings and adaptations [End Page 141] of Brecht's works by Aras Ören, who has made use of Brecht's dialectical approach to support Turkish guest workers in Germany by providing them agency and opening up spaces for a political education for Turks and Germans who provide manual labor. Ören made a critical intervention into the reception of Brecht's oeuvre by changing some aspects to fit the needs of the new situation of Turkish workers in Germany. Similarly, other artists such as Wolf Biermann changed the official Brecht reception accepted by the East German government to an approach that was critical of the dictatorial aspects of that government. In the third and last chapter, Gezen examines Brecht's influence on some of Emine Sevgi Özdamar's novels. Özdamar came to Germany to work at the Volksbühne as a theater practitioner. She lived in West Berlin, worked in East Berlin, and crossed the German-German border on a daily basis. (Because of her Turkish passport, she had no problem crossing the border.) Özdamar compares Brecht's literary reaction to fascism with her own writings against suppressive political developments in Turkey in the 1960s and 1970s. Gezen's book also includes a number of rare photos of Ören and Özdamar as actors in Brecht's plays. Gezen makes a particularly interesting connection between Brecht's montage strategies of including music and visuals and Özdamar's novels. Özdamar makes use of montage when the narrator changes the temporality of the plot and superimposes images from her past in Istanbul onto her life in East and West Berlin. The often-used Brechtian theatrical technique of the revolving stage is mirrored in Özdamar's text when thought processes go in circles rather than following a linear path. Even though Gezen does not emphasize her feminist perspective, she draws on feminist scholarship such as Claudia Breger's work on montage, Monika Shafi's view of the female narrator, Yasemin Yildiz's argument about "translational exchange," and Sonja Klocke's research on the revolving stage. Gezen correctly points to connections between her research and that of Turkish-German scholarship on post-Wall literature, in particular the post-migrant theater of...

Brecht, Turkish Theatre, and Turkish-German Literature: Reception, Adaptation, and Innovation after 1960

Brecht, Turkish Theatre, and Turkish-German Literature: Reception, Adaptation, and Innovation after 1960

TİYATRO ÇEVİRİSİ SÜRECİNDE KARŞILAŞILAN SORUNLAR VE ÇÖZÜM ÖNERİLERİ

Alfred de Musset's work Il Ne Faut Jurer de Rien written in 1836 aims to shed light on the world of science and art by bringing the theater piece to the Turkish language and to give a work to the Turkish theater by theater translation. Because, thanks to the studies carried out in the academic field, the world of science and art is developing and making progress by taking one step towards science. Science, effort requires effort. The development of new and original sciences depends on the questioning nature of the scientist. The social acceptability of the translation carried out must be taken into account. Theater is a part of life. History, the present and the future help us to understand. It makes you think while you train people. Through this work both the or etical and practical benefits will be obtained.

The Quest of Young Turkish Playwrights: In-Yer-Face Theatre

Abstract In-yer-face theatre, which emerged in Britain in the 1990s, became extremely popular on the stages of Istanbul in the new millennium. Some critics considered this new outburst as another phase of imitation. This phase, however, gave way to a new wave of playwrights that wrote about Turkey’s own controversial problems. Many topics, such as LGBT issues, found voice for the first time in the history of Turkish theatre. This study examines why in-yer-face theatre became so popular in this specific period and how it affected young Turkish playwrights in the light of Turkey’s political atmosphere.

Integration, Turkish Theatre, and Cultural-Political Interventions in West Berlin: Vasıf Öngören's Kollektiv Theater (1980–82)

Integration, Turkish Theatre, and Cultural-Political Interventions in West Berlin:Vasıf Öngören's Kollektiv Theater (1980–82) Ela Gezen (bio) Introduction The mid-1970s and early 1980s witnessed the development of a very active Turkish art scene in West Berlin.1 Various cultural institutions were integral to this process, especially the Kunstamt Kreuzberg and Neukölln (Arts Council for the districts of Kreuzberg and Neukölln), the Künstlerhaus Bethanien (Artists' House Bethanien, a center for arts and social affairs), the Deutsch-Türkische Gesellschaft e.V. (German-Turkish Society), and the Türkischer Akademiker- und Künstlerverein (Turkish Academics and Artists Association). Frequently collaborating with one another, these organizations sponsored recurring cultural events, such as ausländischer Berliner (foreign Berliner), the Fest auf dem Mariannenplatz (Festival on the Mariannenplatz), and the Türkische Kulturwochen (Turkish Cultural Weeks). Financially supported by the Berlin Senate, these public events showcased a variety of genres and media, including music, visual arts, theatre, and film; participants and organizers alike aimed to promote Turkish culture beyond folklorization, Orientalization, and essentialization. Particularly prominent among the rosters of participants were Turkish theatre ensembles. A majority of these ensembles, such as the Berlin Oyuncular (Berlin Actors, 1976), the Kreuzberger Türkische Volksbühne (Kreuzberg Turkish People's Theatre, 1978), the Türkisches Arbeitertheater [End Page 301] (Turkish Workers' Theatre, 1979) and the Kollektiv Theater (Collective Theatre, 1968) included professional theatre practitioners who had left Turkey for political reasons.2 In this essay, I will focus on the Kollektiv Theater, an ensemble that was founded by dramatist Vasıf Öngören3 in Turkey. Re-established in West Berlin after his emigration from Turkey in 1980, the Kollektiv Theater contributed to political debates on integration in West Germany through theatre. Rather than analyze specific productions, I will instead situate Öngören's ensemble's theatre practice with respect to efforts by Turkish artists and intellectuals during the late 1970s and early 1980s, discussing the project both as an early manifestation of Turkish self-presentation in West Germany, and, more specifically, as a key part of the formation of a Turkish public sphere in West Berlin. First, I will examine the founding of—and interactions between—the institutions mentioned above, which were designed to promote cultural events. As I will show, cultural practices, and specifically theatre, were understood as crucial factors within discourses on integration (as opposed to assimilation). The Kollektiv Theater's programming and contributions will be read as a current within broader efforts to represent Turkish culture as multi-layered and as essential to political debates on integration. This essay concludes by asking how we may relate Turkish theatrical activities in the early phase of Turkish migration to theatre practices today, such as the postmigrant theatre movement. Cultural-Political Interventions and Collaborations Turkish artists, intellectuals, and academics founded associations in West Berlin throughout the 1970s and 1980s in order to establish institutional settings for the planning of cultural activities, with collaborative efforts presenting a particular priority. Two institutions which I would like to highlight specifically are the Türkischer Akademiker- und Künstlerverein (Turkish Academics and Artists Association) and the Deutsch-Türkische Gesellschaft (German-Turkish Society), which were crucial for self-advocacy and self-representation through culture as well as for collaborations with local and district authorities charged with sponsoring cultural programming such as the Kunstamt Kreuzberg and Kunstamt Neukölln. Established in 1980, the Deutsch-Türkische [End Page 302] Gesellschaft aimed to foster "mutual understanding between the Turkish and German population" while promoting the "integration of the foreign population by maintaining their cultural identity."4 This entailed efforts to foster the necessary conditions for an understanding of "differing historical, social, political, and cultural conditions, and the awareness of their changeability."5 Integration, here, was understood as realizing and implementing political and social equality while also increasing the willingness of Germans to actively participate in this process. The Deutsch-Türkische Gesellschaft underlined the bidirectionality of such processes of integration by involving Turks and Germans equally, while foregrounding as a premise the familiarity with changing societal conditions in both countries. In addition to organizing cultural events, its objectives included taking positions on current issues...

Palimpsests of Violence: Urban Dispossession and Political Theatre in Istanbul

Palimpsests of Violence:Urban Dispossession and Political Theatre in Istanbul Emine Fişek (bio) What is the relationship between theatre and politics in contemporary Turkey? The answer to this question is linked to the proliferation of so-called alternative theatres in Istanbul in the twenty-first century. Designating theatre ventures that exist outside the publicly funded state and municipal theatre circuits, the phrase "alternative theater" is one way in which artists, critics, and audiences have referenced the proliferation of theatrical activity that has characterized the new millennium. Of course, a broader historical lens reminds us that experimental theatre companies had already emerged in Turkish metropoles in the 1960s; but the sheer political, aesthetic, and institutional variety of twenty-first-century alternative theatre is better traced to the late 1980s and early 1990s, when Istanbul-based ventures like Bilsak Tiyatro, Kumpanya, 5. Sokak Oyuncuları, and Şahika Tekand's Stüdyo Oyuncuları sought to create autonomous spaces for theatrical expression, research, and pedagogy. This search has only accelerated in the twenty-first century, with new spaces like GalataPerform, Kumbaracı50, DOT, Moda Sahnesi, İkinciKat, MekanArtı, and Şermola Performans (among many others) vying for public visibility. Alternative theatre is not a monolithic whole, yet one trend that has characterized the domain's emergent work is a concern with the politics of both collective and individual memory as well as the complexities of national identity in twentieth-century Turkey. If Turkish theatre has witnessed a shifting terrain in the new millennium, however, so has Turkish politics. The ascendancy and rule of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) has challenged the Kemalist [End Page 349] state project that had previously defined Republican history, with its emphasis on Turkish nation-statehood and secular modernization. Campaigning on a neoliberal brand of Islamic social conservatism, part of what the AKP has introduced into Turkish political life is a historiographic tendency in which an array of past political grievances are brought together to rewrite Kemalist memory politics. While drawing attention to the "multiplicity of alternative memories" that have emerged in the wake of this shift, Onur Bakıner nonetheless signals the arrival of "a new state-sanctioned historiography," where conservative-nationalist readings of the past have resulted in selective reckonings as well as further silencings.1 Two trends in particular are important to note: first, the emergence of a depoliticized memory of the country's successive military coups that obscures the history of human rights violations, and second, a discourse of neo-Ottomanism that both imagines a Muslim-Turkish imperial past and engages in facile celebrations of Ottoman multiculturalism. How did alternative theatre respond to this shifting terrain? How did playwrights and theatre artists negotiate the possibilities as well as the limitations of conducting political theatre in the new millennium? In this essay, I focus on Ahmet Sami Özbudak's play İz (The Stain), which was directed by Yeşim Özsoy at the alternative theatre venue GalataPerform in Istanbul in 2013, to formulate some preliminary answers to these questions. İz was created by Özbudak in 2010, in the context of the Yeni Metin, Yeni Tiyatro (New Text, New Theatre) writing workshops that Özsoy had been organizing at GalataPerform since 2006. Since then, the play has had a smooth run, and the company celebrated their hundredth performance in June 2016. Meanwhile, Özbudak has published a novelized version of the narrative that also includes the playtext, and negotiations are in process for a film adaptation. The play, in other words, has grown beyond its seemingly medium-specific identity, despite a tight dramaturgical structure and pronounced use of theatrical space and media. What is the play's enduring appeal? İz tells three concurrent stories, each of which is anchored around a specific moment in modern Turkish history. The first story is set in 1955 and centers on Rum (Anatolian Greek) sisters Eleni and Markiz, who are tending to their mother, an elderly woman who has not exited her bedroom in a number of months. As they [End Page 350] discuss their mother's condition, the political tension that underlies their everyday existence culminates in the events of September 6–7, during which Istanbul's Greek community was systematically attacked by Turkish mobs...