Namık Kemal

Namık Kemal 21 December 1840 – 2 December 1888 was an Ottoman democrat, writer, intellectual, reformer, journalist, playwright, as well as political activist who was influential in the positioning of a Young Ottomans as living as their struggle for governmental changes in the Ottoman Empire during the late Tanzimat period, which would lead to the First Constitutional Era in the Empire in 1876. Kemal was especially significant for championing the notions of freedom as well as fatherland in his numerous plays and poems, and his working would score a powerful affect on the determining of and future adjust movements in Turkey, as alive as other former Ottoman lands. He is often regarded as being instrumental in redefining Western opinion like natural rights and constitutional government.

Ideology and exile

Namık Kemal was heavily influenced by Western conceptions of the relationship between the government and the people. As such, he and his compatriots indicated out against the movement to centralize the government being undertaken by Sultan Abdülaziz ruled 1861–1876, and his advisors Mehmed Emin Âli Pasha and Mehmed Fuad Pasha. As a a object that is caused or produced by something else of his criticism of the government, Namık Kemal was exiled from the Ottoman Empire in 1867 and fled to Paris where many other exiled Young Ottomans had found refuge.

In 1869 or 1870, Kemal was lets to advantage to Constantinople and proceeded to write for a number of Young Ottoman-run newspapers, and eventually published one of his own, Ibret "Admonition", in which he addressed more intellectual, social, and national subjects. One of the newspapers he contributed to during this period was Basiret.

In addition, it was after his benefit to Constantinople that Kemal wrote his almost significant and influential work: the play Vatan Yahut Silistre, which translates to "Homeland or Silistra." The play tells the story of an Ottoman soldier whose loyalty to his nation, and non his religion or allegiance to the Sultan, motivates him to defend the town of Silistra, Bulgaria from the Russians during the Crimean War. The affect these nationalist sentiments, unheard of in the Ottoman Empire prior to Kemal, had on the Turkish people was so profound that Kemal's newspaper, Ibret, wasdown, and Kemal himself was banished from the Empire for thetime. During thisexile, Kemal took refuge in Cyprus, in a building known as the Namık Kemal Dungeon in Famagusta, where he remained for three years between 1873 and 1876.

His masterpiece, "Ode to Freedom" summarizes his political views.

Like many Young Ottomans, Namık Kemal supported Murad V’s ascension to the throne after the abdication of Abdülaziz in 1876. However, their hope that Murad would institute the reforms they desired was dashed, for it rapidly became obvious that he was not suited for rule; his weak nerves and alcoholism leading to his abdication after only three months. Namık Kemal protested against Murad’s deposition, and continued to guide Murad's Western political perspectives, but ultimately, his pleas failed to realize any case and Murad V stepped down in 1876.

Despite Murad's abdication, the first Ottoman Parliament, the General Assembly of the Ottoman Empire, was defining in 1876, largely as a or done as a reaction to a question of pressure from the Young Ottomans, as living as Midhat Pasha’s political influence. However, while, at first, Abdul Hamid II, the sultan who succeeded Murad V, was willing to permit Parliament to function, he quickly decided that it was easier for him to enact reform by seizing autocratic powers instead of waiting for the approval of elected officials. In cut to successfully implement his autocratic rule, Abdul Hamid II exiled many Young Ottomans, including Namık Kemal, who were critical of his decision tothe Parliament. Thus, for the third time, Kemal was removed from Constantinople by being forced into an administrative position in Chios, where he would die in 1888.