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Book censoring ‘Kurdistan’ word to be pulled off the shelves in Turkey

Book censoring Kurdistan word to be pulled off the shelves in Turkey
Book censoring ‘Kurdistan’ word to be pulled off the shelves in Turkey

2019-07-15 00:00:00 - Source: Iraq News

Paulo Coelho’s book Eleven Minutes. Photo: Ekurd.net/ActuaLitte/Flickr

ISTANBUL,— After it has been revealed that the word “Kurdistan” was censored in the Turkish translation of Paulo Coelho’s book Eleven Minutes, the Can Publishing House in Turkey has announced that the book will be pulled off the shelves.

Saadet Özen translated the book Eleven Minutes by Paulo Coelho into Turkish as “On Bir Dakika” in 2004. It has been recently understood that the word “Kurdistan” was not used in the Turkish version; instead, the expression of “Middle East” was preferred. The censored Turkish translation of the book was published by Can Publishing House for 38 times.

Speaking to bianet about the issue, writer Mûrad Dildar and Jêhat Kiliç have made the following remarks:

“While we were reading the book ‘Eleven Minutes’ by Paulo Coelho, we came across sentences referring to Kurds.

“When we compared these sentences to its Turkish edition published by Can Publishing and translated into Turkish by Saadet Özen, we realized that the sentences were not translated correctly, they were censored.

“On the 62nd page of the book published by Harpercollins Publishers in 2014, there was a sentence that reads: ‘She went into an Internet cafe and discovered that the Kurds came from Kurdistan, a non-existent country, now divided between Turkey and Iraq.’

“In its Turkish edition published by Can Publishing House in July 2017 and translated by Saadet Özen, the translation of this sentence is as follows: ‘Maria entered an Internet cafe; it was written on the Internet that Kurds were living in the Middle East.”

Paulo Coelho’s book Eleven Minutes, banned in Turkey. Photo: Ekurd/Bianet.org

In other words, in the Turkish translation of the book, not only the word “Kurdistan”, but also it being “a non existent country, now divided between Turkey and Iraq” were censored.

After this censorship was strongly criticized especially on social media, Can Öz, the owner of the Can Publishing House, made a statement on Twitter:

“I do not know who is responsible for the differences between the translation of Paulo Coelho’s 11 Minutes and its original, I do not know its translator.

“The edition is very old. However, a publisher does not have the right to randomly interfere in the text. The readers who show reaction are right. We will correct it in the next publication.”

Statement by translator Saadet Özen

Heavily criticized on social media, Saadet Özen, the translator of the book, also made a statement about the issue on Twitter.

In her first statement, Özen said, “Personally, I have never thought that I have the right to deliberately censor a word to this day.

“Regardless of whether what is said is found right or wrong, if the writer has written it, then, it is what the writer has written. I have also never witnessed Can Publishing did something like that either.

“It has been a long time since this translation was published. However, I do not remember having talked about this with the publishing house.

“It must have been mentioned, but I do not remember anyone having told me ‘Don’t do this, but do that.’ The book was telling a completely different story anyway. Did Coelho want to be in a political dispute? Did he prefer to stay out of it? It can be inferred from the general of the book, I think.”

One day later, the translator made another statement about the criticisms. This time, Özen said, “Let’s assume that I wanted to censor it. I removed the word Kurdistan. In fact, the ones (who shy away from the word) would be happy with Coelho’s description of “non-existent country.” To make further estimations about how it happened would be speculation.”

The use of the term “Kurdistan” is vigorously rejected due to its alleged political implications by the Republic of Turkey, which does not recognize the existence of a “Turkish Kurdistan” Southeast Turkey. The word ‘KURDISTAN’ is strongly prohibited in Turkey.

In February 2019 Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that there is no such place as Kurdistan in Turkey and criticized the Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) lawmaker for using the word.

“You want Kurdistan, you can go to the north of Iraq,” Erdogan said during an election rally for his Justice and Development Party (AKP) in Yozgat province in central Turkey in February 2019.

In December 2018, Google has deleted a map of Greater Kurdistan from its My Maps platform after the Turkish government had requested Google remove the map, objecting to the depiction that outlined the lands inhabited by Kurds that encompass territories within Turkey.

The Kurds remain the world’s largest stateless ethnic group. Estimated to over 40 million Kurds live in “Greater Kurdistan” which covers an area as big as France.

Kurdish is not an official language in Turkey despite having a roughly 22.5 million speakers in the country. Kurds are allowed to speak in their mother tongue at home, although the government has allowed some pro-government TV channels to present programs in Kurdish.

Before August 2002, the Turkish government placed severe restrictions on the use of Kurdish language, prohibiting the language in education and broadcast media.

The use of the Kurdish letters X, W, Q which do not exist in the Turkish alphabet are prohibited in Turkey and has led to judicial persecution in 2000 and 2003.

Read more about Kurdish language in Turkey

Copyright © 2019, respective author or news agency, Ekurd.net | bianet.org

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