Gaby Latif · Monte Carlo Doualiya · 12 February 2024 · Arabic · Radio
In Monte Carlo Doualiya’s programme “Hiwar” (Conversation), Gaby Latif hosts the Turkish writer, translator and academic Dr. Mehmet Hakkı Suçin, professor of Arabic at Gazi University in Ankara, to talk about his role in building bridges between Arab and Turkish cultures through translation, poetry and prose. Through his own writing and his translations of Khalil Gibran, Adonis, Mahmoud Darwish and many others, he has carried many treasures of the Arab heritage into Turkish.
A lover of the Arabic language
Regarded as one of the most prominent Turkish intellectuals championing Arabic, Suçin has broken through the walls of academia to work in many fields, combining translation and authorship in both Arabic and Turkish. He served on the jury of the International Prize for Arabic Fiction (the Arabic Booker) in 2014 and on the jury of the Sheikh Hamad Award for Translation in 2015.
Communication between Arabic and Turkish literature
Suçin describes the Arab and Turkish peoples as close to one another yet distant in literary terms, with prejudices that came from outside their own will. These prejudices, he says, stem from the peoples’ not knowing each other, although they come from the same cultural basin. He adds that while studying Arabic he noticed the absence of any relationship between the two literatures, which led him to help bring the two cultures – and the two peoples – closer by translating masterpieces of Arabic literature for Turkish readers.
Arabic’s deep ties with the Turks
Suçin points to the historical place of Arabic among Turks, owing to history and to the Turks’ embrace of Islam and their adoption of Arabic as a language of learning and religion. He notes that Arabic is the second language in middle schools after English and has a foothold in Turkey. Yet it remains confined to the role of a religious language rather than a language of literature and civilisation – which is what he works to change through his translations, by bringing Arabic poetry to poetry festivals, and through short-story translations, so as to highlight the cultural and civilisational side of Arabic in Turkish society.
Source: Monte Carlo Doualiya, 12 February 2024. The programme is in Arabic; this introduction was translated from the Arabic for this site.