Walking against wind, Nazim Hikmet’s works link Russia, Turkey

By Elena Teslova

MOSCOW (AA) - Although an intrinsic human link between Turkish and Russian literature, the poet, playwright, and novelist Nazim Hikmet Ran, commonly known as Nazım Hikmet, who considered himself the son of two motherlands never felt at peace in both countries.

Nazım Hikmet, whose death anniversary is being commemorated on Wednesday, started to write poems under the influence of his grandfather Nazim Pasha at an early age.

His first collection of Turkish poems 28 Kanunisani, published in the then Soviet Union was warmly received. He never wrote poems in Russian, although he had developed perfection in the language.

Fascinated by Russian futurism -- an artistic and social movement -- Nazım Hikmet migrated to Moscow after participating in the Turkish war of independence led by the founder of the Turkish Republic, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.

"In my youth, I started with poems that used only folk and classical rhythmic units. After coming to the Soviet Union in search of new forms, I began to write in free verse," he wrote in his memoirs.

In Moscow, he joined the Communist Party and called himself a communist, which meant for him believing in social equality, protection of rights, and freedom of speech.

His idea of socialism without political games led him to criticize sharply powers deviating from his beliefs. Soon he was labeled a Trotskyist agent in the Soviet Union and a Russian agent in the Turkish Republic. Soviet revolutionary Leon Trotsky’s theories were seen anti-Joseph Stalin.

He returned to Turkey to pursue his literary tastes and to bring up his only son. But he was kept under surveillance and then imprisoned in 1938.

The prison walls, however, did not deter him to pursue literary works. He wrote, poems, stories and translated two of four volumes of Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace.

After the end of World War II, Nazım Hikmet was released and he soon left for the Soviet Union once again.

He was received in Moscow with open arms. His books were published and sold in large numbers. He never felt like a foreigner in the country.

"Such people like Nazim cannot be foreigners because their hearts are global passports," his colleagues said about him.

- Confrontation with Stalin

But his mercurial behavior and his beliefs in human rights again put his face to face with Stalin’s personality.

"When I was in a solitary cell [in prison], I survived, perhaps only because I dreamed of Moscow theaters. I dreamed of Meyerhold and Mayakovsky… This was the very revolution of the streets, which had passed into a revolution of the stage," he wrote.

But he added that he was appalled by the state of the cultural life in general.

"I saw petty-bourgeois, tasteless art that for some reason calls itself realism, and even socialist [realism]. Besides, I saw so much sycophancy on and around the stage. Can sycophancy be revolutionary?" he asked.

He said that he will tell Stalin directly that he must remove his statues and portraits built and hung all over the country. "It is so vulgar," he complained to his friends.

The Soviet secret police KGB soon listed him as a descendent and started tailing him. His words were reported to Stalin, who canceled his scheduled meeting with the literary genius.

Nazim Hikmet's associates remember him as an uncompressing personality and a person who walked against the wind.

To protest against Stalin, Nazim Hikmet wrote a satirical play -- Was There Ivan Ivanovich? He depicted the transformation of a personality into an object in a system.

"The Soviet Union is my second homeland, and I love the Soviet people very much. That is why I have to act as every honest person here acts. But even if I am only a guest in the Soviet Union, in this most beautiful house on earth, if I see a snake crawling in this house, I must crush it," he wrote.

- Play banned

The play was banned after two performances despite its great success and admiration from spectators.

Living in Moscow, Nazim Hikmet smoothly popularized Turkish folklore and its traditions in the Soviet Union. Since he knew the Russian language, he added Russian flavor to his Turkish stories for the audience back in Turkey.

In his poem about Seyh Bedreddin, he recounted Sufi philosophy. Even in his popular play Was There Ivan Ivanovic, the storytellers are heroes of the Turkish folk theatre -- Karagoz and Hacivat.

His drama Ferhat and Sirin was choreographed as a ballet. Russian best stages including the Bolshoi Theatre performed his dramas. He also wrote scripts for four films.

A library named after him located in the residential building where he lived in Moscow, with a museum exhibiting his things, holds events to commemorate him.

- Grave in Moscow has soil form Istanbul

Since opening its office in Moscow, the Turkish non-profit Yunus Emre Institute organizes events occasionally to glorify the writer. The Institute promotes Turkish language and culture around the world.

Nazim Hikmet passed away in 1963 as a result of a heart attack. He is buried in Moscow's famous Novodevichy Cemetery, where his imposing tombstone is still a place of pilgrimage for Turks and many others from around the world. The place is always covered with fresh flowers, and its ground is mixed with the soil brought from Istanbul.

Even though his last wish to be buried in Turkey was not granted, the Istanbul soil mixed with Moscow earth guarding his grave truly depicts the love he had for both countries.