Nâzım Hikmet

WHAT DID THEY WRITE ABOUT HIM?

Mehmet Ali Aybar (1908-1995)

""WE ARE GOING TO SEE BEAUTIFUL DAYS..."

" 'They brought Nâzım Hikmet!..' The news exploded like a bomb in the Paşakapısı Prison. It was a sunny Sunday. It was probably one of the first days of May. The year was 1950. I rushed up to the office of the director. I climbed up the stairs breathlessly. I had just reached the door when the glass door opened. There he was¾Nâzım... As we embraced each other, I realised how the years had passed. We stared at each other without uttering a word. Suddenly Nâzım said, 'How nice that you have become a communist'. 'The walls have ears', I said. We laughed.

"Knowing that it was not possible, I nevertheless hoped that they would let him stay in my ward. But Nâzım would be assigned to the ward of the communists, for sure. We climbed down the stairs. A gaoler was waiting for us. The ward was right there where he was waiting for us. There were scenes of happiness again. Galip Usta and his friends had already prepared Nâzım's bed.

"At times I went to Nâzım's ward and at other times he came to mine. We were happy to be together. Nâzım was determined to continue the hunger strike in Bursa. But the National Assembly was on holiday because of the elections. That meant there was not an addressee for the hunger strike. However, Nâzım decided to begin the strike immediately because he did not want to create a false opinion in the eyes of the people. And he wanted to put pressure on the new National Assembly and the government. Everything was to be done exactly when it had to be done. We, one the other hand, were afraid of losing him and our fear was not in vain.

"He started the hunger strike. He only drank water. I told him to lie down. He did not listen. There were innumerable visitors. It would not be a lie if I said that his first days at the Paşakapısı were spent at the office of the director. He was still cheerful. However, as the days passed, his movements began to slow down. I suggested he continue the strike under a doctor's control. 'Don't you start too', he said. I knew that those friends who came to see him were also insisting that he should stay at the hospital. 'I am thinking in political terms. You are the strongest chance of the Turkish leftist movement. You do not have the right to die', I said. He laughed. 'Do not exaggerate', he said.

"Nâzım's hunger strike had attracted much attention. There was news in the papers about it. Almost everybody knew by that time that Nâzım did not commit a crime such as 'provoking the navy to revolt'. And there were whispers going on that this was an act of Marshal Çakmak. The university students were publishing a magazine called Nâzım Hikmet. And some intellectuals were collecting signatures so that he would be released. His mother stood on the bridge, a banner in her hand, asking people for support for his release. There was news in the foreign press about the strike, too. Nâzım's hunger strike was at the top of the agenda.

"One day, during a conversation, Nâzım said 'I read your writings in Vatan magazine'. These were the sarcastic sort of writings about Inönü giving way to the multi-party regime. However, at the end of a series of writings, I explained what I was thinking of when I talked about socialism. I had suggested a socialism that aimed for humanism. All of a sudden I thought of arguing this with Nâzım. I decided not to because I did not want him to get tired. And there was no such other for such an argument after that. Nâzım, whose poems were full of humanism, would certainly have had a lot to say about this topic.

"As days went by, his illness intensified. At the end, he accepted to go to the hospital. He was brought to the Cerrahpaşa Hospital. The doctors said that his condition was serious. Vâlâ and Zekeriya managed to make him stop the hunger strike, once more reminding him that the Assembly was on holiday. The Democrat Party that came to power declared general amnesty and thus Nâzım's 13 years of suffering came to an end.

***

"Nâzım had found a job in Ipekçiler; he was writing scripts for films, of course without signing his real name. He and Münevver were living at his mother's house in Cevizlik. I and Siret were in Kuzguncuk. We were not so far from each other. We met frequently. Münevver was pregnant. She gave birth to a healthy boy. They called him Mehmet: Memo. They were happy.

"The next act in his life was the summons to military service. But he was discharged as unfit for duty after he graduated from the Naval School. And he had developed a heart condition during the years in prison. His liver too was ailing. The prison administration was aware of his health condition, so was the Ministry of Justice. Despite the fact that they knew of his condition, they summoned him for military service and this made us suspect that something was astir. He went to the conscription office and reported his state of health. The head of the office approached him in an understanding manner and told him that he was going to report this to Ankara. We felt relaxed since there were no further summons even though months elapsed.

"But one day he was called again from the conscription office. It was ordered that he be taken into military service. He was going to be transferred to one of the eastern cities which I do not remember now. They had told him to come in a week. We were all surprised. Nâzım was saying that he would not be able to survive two-year military service. But the thing that made him and us thoughtful was the intention behind this summons. They were probably going to jail him again with the help of a couple of false witnesses. Or perhaps a stray bullet would do it...

"On one of those days when we were immersed in dark thoughts, Nâzım declared: 'I'm going'. One of his paternal relatives, a very young man whom you ran into one a long while, a brave young man, Refik Erduran, said to him, 'Brother, you know those boats that sail over the sea as if they flew? I am going to sail you out to the Black Sea in one of those. You'll hop on one of the ships going up north and take it from there'. He trusted Refik. 'It's too risky', I said. 'Yes, risky', he said, 'but I do not have any other chance'.

"We embraced each other and said good bye. I did not see Nâzım again. Years later he died, in alien lands, without losing his belief that we were going to see beautiful days." (7 October 1990)