APPENDIX 2
YAKUP KADRI’S ATEŞTEN GÖMLEK – ENGLISH TRANSLATION
FRAGMENT A
313
for the army. If he was here I swear by God they could not touch a hair of mine.
Now, now look what they have done to me ( she was showing to me the inside of her
arms, and her bleeding feet), they attacked me with the cattle goad.
As Cennet was about to explain some things in this way we saw many villagers,
women, men and children running towards us from left and right.
----Come, get into the tent, I told her.
Cennet accepted my warning with great agitation. The villagers surrounded me
immediately, they were all in great excitement, there were tears in the children’s
eyes, the women were pale white and their lips trembled, the men’s eyes were seeing
red. They started shouting all together, explaining something to me. But it was not
possible to deduce any meaning from these general cries. Barely holding back my
laughter I said:
----Only one of you speak!
At that moment a rough and rude middle aged woman separated herself from the
middle of the crowd and came forward towards me.
We caught her with our hands, she said. With the son of Usta Ömer… Under the
ridge …the son of Usta Ömer… still yesterday's child he has no hair no spots …she
dragged the child by force…I swear to God, Sir, by force… with her own husband’s
son (and turning back), there, his mother here too …
APPENDIX 2
YAKUP KADRI’S ATEŞTEN GÖMLEK – ENGLISH TRANSLATION
FRAGMENT A
314
One more woman comes emerging from the crowd and completes what the first
woman had said in a darker manner. Then a man joins in… I am in exactly the same
circumstances as was Jesus when surrounded by those who complained of the
adulterous Samaritan
1
woman. If I were to repeat the words of the merciful and
compassionate Prophet (he that is without sin among you let him first cast a stone at
her!) would they understand and become silent?
No… no way, suddenly a strong wind of wrath wrapped everyone with great force.
Shall I hand over the victim to calm this excessive rage? I suddenly gathered all my
will and with a commanding manner not at all natural to me:
---You go away now, we will see to her punishment. I said.
And I turned and entered my tent. Crouched in a corner Cennet was looking at me
with startled eyes. She was exactly like a beaten up cat. I approached her, she
showed me in silence all her wounds. I shrugged my shoulders.
---You deserve it. If what they say is true be grateful that you have so far escaped
like that. I said.
Without answering she lowered her eyes. She would act exactly like this at home. At
the end of every sin or infidelity when I looked attentively at her face and before the
1
The woman taken in adultery in John 8 is merely adulterous and not a Samaritan. Yakup Kadri must
have confused her with the woman of Samaria in John 4 who had had many husbands. Presumably he
had a memory of the Scripture classes from his French school.
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