Âteş-zâde Mehmed İzzet Pasha's translation of Yûsuf u Züleyhâ (Transcribed text – analysis)

Classical Turkish Literature has gone through various stages from its formation to the declaration of the Tanzimat Fermanı. With the transformation in the social and political structure; such stages involved changes in the understanding of poetry, literary circles, metaphors, literary arts, and verse forms, continuing until the end of the 19th century. It is seen that a different understanding of art developed in literature in the 19th century. Artists of this period worked on new themes, but they remained loyal to the old in terms of prosody, language and verse forms, as they grew up with the artistic taste of the old poetry. In this period when old and new poetry were intertwined, Classical Turkish Literature also gave its final products. Poets such as Leskofçalı Galip, Hersekli Arif Hikmet and Yenişehirli Avni maintained the classical understanding of poetry, while Keçecizade İzzet Molla, Hasan Aynî and Mehmed İzzet Pasha were the last representatives of masnavi literature. Masnavi is a preferred verse form for narrative texts. Poets in Turkish literature took their themes from Arab-Persian masnavis, historical-religious-moral stories and their own experiences. It is noteworthy that several poets translated the masnavis, which took their source from Arabic and Persian literature. In the masnavi literature, which has become rich with these translations, the poet aims to reveal his own talent by presenting a more successful work than the source of his translation. One of the basic characteristics of classical literature is reflecting the poet's original style within the framework of the rules of tradition. In Turkish literature, many translations of masnavis from Persian such as Mantıku't-Tayr, Hüsrev ü Şîrîn, Cemşid ü Hurşid were made. While some of these masnavis are literal translations, some of them are close to original re-writing. Among the masnavis of the last period, the masnavi named Yûsuf u Züleyhâ by Mütercim Mehmed İzzet Pasha draws attention. This masnavi is one of the examples of verse translation of the Persian poet Molla Câmî's Yûsuf u Züleyhâ. Yûsuf u Züleyhâ is a masnavi that has been brought to Turkish literature by many translations from Şeyyad Hamza to Hamdullah Hamdî and Kemal Paşa-zâde. The translation of İzzet Pasha stands out among other masnavis of the same period in terms of translation and commentary activities in Turkish literature, with its features such as; showing an almost exact translation from Persian, the presence of Persian beyits in the text together their Turkish translations, providing the meanings of some words and explaining some concepts in addition to the text, notes on literary arts, and translations of the Quran verses which are the source of the story. In addition, the text includes Latin script notes and punctuation marks. Yûsuf u Züleyhâ reflects the contributions of İzzet Pasha to the translation, who was one of the enlightened personalities of the period and had a good command of Persian. The work can be considered as a product in which İzzet Pasha, who is also the author of a dictionary named Kâmûs-ı Fârisî, demonstrates his translation skills. In Pasha's manuscript, it is possible to follow the translation adventure of a masnavi. It is obvious that there is an effort to reach a better translation in terms of prosody, style and meaning, as demonstrated by more than one translation examples for some beyits. Although the text presents a gradually maturing structure, it consists of 55 leaves and was not completed. This study, which deals with Mütercim Mehmed İzzet Pasha's Yûsuf u Züleyhâ masnavi, consists of four chapters. In the first chapter, information is given Yûsuf u Züleyhâ masnavis and the author of the work about the translation tradition in Classical Turkish Literature context and Molla Câmî's Yûsuf u Züleyhâ. In the second chapter, Mehmet İzzet Pasha is introduced and his life and works are discussed. In the third chapter, Mehmed İzzet Pasha's Yûsuf u Züleyhâ masnavi, which is the subject of the study, is examined. In addition to the form and content characteristics, the translation method has been evaluated and compared with the work of Molla Câmî. The fourth chapter contains the transcripted text of the work. Keywords: Ateş-zade Mehmed İzzet Paşa, Molla Cami, Yusuf u Züleyha, translation