Madeleine Elfenbein

MESA 2016 Talk: Teodor Kasap and the Making of an Ottomanist Public, 1870-1877
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How do you create a coherent whole out of many parts? I want to start by acknowledging

and the topicality of this question. I promise you this isn’t a political science panel, it’s a history

panel. Still, I can’t help being struck by how this question still haunts our politics.

The question of unity in the face of diversity was at the core of the political and

existential dilemma that faced the Ottoman state in the nineteenth century, as it sought to reckon

with the newly problematized existence of its substantial non-Muslim population. From the

eighteenth century onward, Russia and other states had begun to use the plight of Ottoman

religious minorities, particularly Christians, as a cudgel against Ottoman sovereignty. I don’t

need to tell you how that story ends. But I’m interested in how the Young Ottoman movement of

the 1860s and 1870s emerged as a response to this question.

Throughout the second half of the nineteenth century, much Ottoman and European ink

would be spilled over the situation of Ottoman minorities, particularly Christians, and the

increasingly disputed right of Muslims to govern them. As the political stakes of the debate

emerged more sharply as an existential threat to the future of the Ottoman polity, a substantial

number of Ottoman Christians and Jews would argue forcefully for their right to be governed by

Muslims, or at least by a state nominally founded on Islamic law. Teodor Kasap, my subject

today, was only the most prominent Ottoman journalist to take this position. As he declared in a
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phrase printed beneath the title of his newspaper İstikbâl, the sons of the homeland are a unified

body [cism-i vahid] that will not tolerate political division.”1

But there’s another part to the story. The problem of achieving unity in diversity runs

much deeper than the problem of tolerance and its limits; it’s a problem of how to actively

cultivate a sufficient sense of political belonging in a society whose ethnic and religious fault-

lines are being deliberately cracked open with a crowbar. In such moments, what does it mean to

“embrace difference”?

[Slide 2: The courier, with whip]

The Young Ottoman project was to build a culturally pluralist and yet politically viable society

to serve as the bedrock of a legitimate Ottoman state – one whose sovereignty would be

internationally recognized and respected. In today’s talk, I want to focus on an aspect of this

project that I believe is central yet overlooked: the cultural dimension of this task. I argue that

one of the great challenges of the Young Ottomans was to articulate a cosmopolitan worldview

while demarcating clear and defensible national boundaries: a cosmopolitanism with limits.

[Slide 3: Kasap, standing, while French hoca at the muhendishane]

By virtue of his birth, upbringing, and life trajectory, Teodor Kasap was perfectly

positioned to set those limits. Born in Kayseri as part of large Karamanli community in Central

Anatolia, Kasap was raised speaking Turkish, like his Muslim neighbors and many of his

Armenian neighbors as well. His merchant family was able to send him east to study in Greek at

1
“Ebnâ-yı vatan ki cism-i vâhiddir siyâseten taksîm kabûl etmez.” The phrase began to appear with İstikbâl No. 115
(26 cumadelevvel 1293 [18 June 1876]), following the deposition of Abdülaziz, and appeared in the title strip of
every issue until No. 202 (20 Zilhicce 1293 [6 January 1877]), when it went back to a version of the words that had
previously appeared in that space: “Ottoman journal published every day except Friday.”
 Madeleine Elfenbein | MESA 2016 Talk | Teodor Kasap and the Making of an Ottomanist Public, 1870-1877
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the Great School of the Nation, run by the Patriarchate in Istanbul. His credentials as a

nineteenth-century cosmopolitan were impeccable: he spent more than a decade of his early

adulthood living in Europe, most of it at the side of the French novelist Alexandre Dumas, one of

the world’s earliest global celebrities, with whom he fought alongside Garibaldi’s Redshirts on

the battlefields of Sicily and Naples for the liberation of Italy from its foreign overlords. Kasap

even had the battle scars to prove it, as his friend Namik Kemal would testify. Well-lettered in

both French and Greek, with international experience fighting for the right to self-rule, he had all

the intellectual and political bona fides of a nineteenth-century cosmopolitan. He was like an

Ottoman Byron, only one who survived the war.

Given the strength of these credentials, it’s fascinating to see what Kasap chose to do

with them. Through a series of mostly satirical journals that he edited and published between

1870 and 1877, he played a central role in advancing the Young Ottoman political project by

building the kind of diverse and inclusive Ottoman public on which it depended. While Namik

Kemal stands out as the leading theorist of the Young Ottoman movement, Kasap ended up as its

most influential practitioner.

It was a hundred and forty-four years ago this month—that is, in late November of

1870—that Kasap decided to found his first Turkish publication, which he did by turning his

bilingual Greek and French magazine, Diogene, into a Turkish-language one. This would have

been a hard decision, since it meant inviting increased scrutiny from state censors who were far

less interested in the contents of Greek and French journals. The decision to switch to Turkish is

especially remarkable in light of the fact that Kasap could barely read or write in his native

tongue. In this he was not unusual; in fact, it was a trait he shared with many of his countrymen,
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Muslim and non-Muslim alike. The impetus for the switch may have come from Namik Kemal,

who ended up playing an important behind-the-scenes role as an anonymous contributor.2

[Slide 4: front cover of Diyogen]

The magazine, named Diyojen after the ancient Greek philosopher Diogenes, was

supposed to be fun to read, but it had a strong sense of mission. As Kasap explained in his

opening letter to Turkish readers, its first mission was to offer “interpretations of public opinion

and of the aims of the imperial government”—very much in keeping with every other newspaper

published in this period, especially those aligned with the Young Ottoman movement. But it also

had a second mission: to provide “eloquence, provocations, and mockery concerning morals,

manners, and things foreign to our homeland.”3

The second set of aims was just as important as the first. Satire, playful provocations, and

outright mockery turned out to be valuable tools for drawing a line in the sand between what the

indigenous and the foreign, and the ability to command these tools persuasively turned out to be

a brilliant way for Kasap to stake a claim to indigeneity for himself and his fellow non-Muslims.

As as we’ll see, Kasap reserved his greatest scorn for fellow non-Muslims whom he

diagnosed with an insufficient respect for, and command of, Ottoman language and culture. And

yet as we’ll also see, his demand for inclusion in that same culture for those who deserved it was

transformative on the culture as a whole.

2
Avni Özgürel, “Diyojen gülmeyi öğretti,” Radikal, October 12, 2003, sec. Yorum,
http://www.radikal.com.tr/haber.php?haberno=91797.
3
Teodor Kasap, “Muqaddime,” Diyojen, no. 1 (November 12, 1286): 1. “[M]aqsadı ise efkâr-ı ümumiye ve
mekâsıd-ı hükûmet-i seniyeye tercümanlık ve ahlâk ü terbiye ve vatanımıza ecnebi olan şeyler hakkında ta’riz ü
istihzâ ile terzebânlıq olduğundan...”
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[Slide 5: Close-up of Diyojen cartoon]

Here you can see a close-up of that cartoon on the front page. As Kasap explained in his

letter to readers, the cartoon depicts a famous episode in the life of Diogenes, his apocryphal

encounter with Alexander the Great. According to legend, Alexander had once sought out

Diogenes to profess his admiration and offer him anything he wanted, to which the philosopher

replied, “Don’t block my sunlight, that’s all I ask.” Here you can see Diogenes’ words in the

caption below the cartoon: “Gölge etme başka ihsan istemem.”4

What’s notable is that Kasap introduced his journal’s mascot to readers not only as an

ancient Greek philosopher, but as “a great madman from Sinop,” a city on the Black Sea coast of

Anatolia, not all that far from Kayseri. In other words, he provincializes Diogenes and marks him

as indigenous. What’s more, he writes, the “spirit and approach” of Diogenes “were deemed

well-suited to the aims of this journal.”5

In other words, not only is the ancient Greek philosopher a man of our homeland, but his

attitude belongs to us as well. As we can see from the cartoon, that attitude turns out to be one of

both humility and manifest contempt for authority. The fact that Kasap showcases this quality as

the crown jewel of his new journal’s ethos tells us something about the kind of “counter-public”

that Kasap wanted to build – one in opposition to, rather than in league with, the reform-minded

state.

4 This cartoon ran below the journal’s title in every issue for its first several months, until it was discontinued with
No. 62, presumably to make space for more text (Sungu, “Diyojen gazetesi,” 339).
5
Diyojen No. 1, 12 Teşrin-i sani 1286 [November 24, 1870]. “Diyojen hukemâ-yı yunaniyeden ḥum-nişinlikle
şöhret-i şi’âr Sinoplu bir meczûb-i kâmil olup meşreb ü mezhebi bu gazetenin muvâfık mesleği olduğundan bu ism
ile tevsimi münasib görüldü.”
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Kasap lost little time in drawing a line in the sand as sharply as he could between the

foreign and indigenous, the better to align himself, his readers, and the figure of “the great

madman” Diogenes on the Ottoman side of the line. His first targets for alienation were the

French and English journals that populated Istanbul newsstands, and which in fact had been the

first journals to circulate in Ottoman territory, where they enjoyed the special privilege of

exemption from censorship. He even attacked the Courrier d’Orient, whose editor had helped

the Young Ottomans escape to Paris in 1867. Despite this connection, Kasap was unrelenting:

“Of what possible use are its language and ideas in the East?”6 As a whole, these journals were

an “abominable assemblage [güruh-ı mekruh] that had abandoned the homeland and snapped the

tether” in “daring to insult the state and nation.”7 Interesting that in this case, Kasap is happy to

use the paired phrase “devlet ü millet,” state and nation, asserting a unity that would seem to run

up against the spirit of the journal embodied in Diogenes.

[Slide 6: Garabed in donkey ears]

Another of Kasap’s recurring targets were his fellow non-Muslim Ottomans, particularly

journalists. A year into his publication run, Kasap splurged on a second illustration, this time for

a satirical depiction of the Armenian newspaper publisher Garabed Panosian, the editor of the

Armeno-Turkish newspaper Manzume-i Efkar, as a man with donkey ears. The only context is a

short announcement appearing at the head of the image, which refers to him as a “curious

creature.” Nowhere is the target named, which makes the illustration something of an inside joke

for those in Istanbul journalism circles. On the one hand, the cartoon can be taken as an act of

6 Mustafa Nihat Özön, “Kemal İstanbul’da,” in Namık Kemal ve İbret gazetesi (Istanbul: Remzi Kitabevi, 1938),
3-4.
7
Diyojen No. 6, 9 February 1871; quoted in Mustafa Nihat Özön, “Kemal İstanbul’da,” in Namık Kemal ve İbret
gazetesi, by Namık Kemal and Mustafa Nihat Özön (Istanbul: Remzi Kitabevi, 1938), 3–4.
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aggression toward Panosian, and perhaps towards Armenians in general. Kasap was unstinting in

his criticism of the Armenian playwright and producer Güllü Agop, calling his work “laughable”

on account of its poor Turkish and unsuitability to the Ottoman cultural milieu, and he was

equally critical of the Armenians on whom he relied to act out his plays. In Kasap’s view, their

Armenian accents spoiled the effect.8

On the other hand, it should be noted that a few months later, Kasap would invite readers

to his publishing house to take lessons in the Armenian alphabet, a service intended for those

who wished to read Armeno-Turkish newspapers.9

[Slide 7: “statistics”]

In the same issue, the journal carried a brief item entitled “A little statistics” [ufacik bir

istatistik] that provided a table of Istanbul’s population and the number of newspapers published

in each language. The numbers are presented without comment, but they make clear that Greeks

and Armenians dominate the press with a total of 16 newspapers despite a combined population

of only 400,000, while the Turks, with a population of 800,000, have only three.

The reader might wonder why Kasap is drawing his Turkish-language readers’ attention

to these statistics. The table certainly serves to heighten his readers’ awareness of the previously

separate linguistic and cultural spheres that Ottomans inhabit, and of their unequal representation

8
Cevdet Kudret, “Teodor Kasap,” in Işkilli Memo: Molière’in Sganarelle ou le Cocu imaginaire imaginaire adlı
komedyansından aktaran, by Teodor Kasap, ed. Cevdet Kudret (Istanbul: Elif Yayınları, 1965), 7. The article in
question is Diyojen No. 161, 9 Teşrinisani 1288/21 November 1872.
9
Johann Strauss, “Is Karamanli Literature Part of a ‘Christian-Turkish (Turco-Christian) Literature’?,” in Cries and
Whispers in Karamanlidika Books: Proceedings of the First International Conference on Karamanlidika Studies
(Nicosia, 11th-13th September 2008), ed. Evangelia Balta and Matthias Kappler (Otto Harrassowitz Verlag, 2010),
182.
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in the journalistic sphere; the question remains, to what end? One aspect of his intervention, it

seems, is to urge these newspapers and communities to acknowledge and address each other.

[Slide 8: Jangling Courier with whip and fellow journalists]

Nowhere is this clearer than in the cartoon published in the inaugural issue of Çıngıraklı

Tatar, on April 5, 1873. Here you can see the Jangling Courier, dressed as a court jester in the

French style and looking quite a bit like Teodor Kasap himself, standing on a rock. In one hand

is a large bell, and in the other, a whip, which he has raised above his head, poised to lash out at

his fellow journalists, who stand before him in various guises and postures, each with the name

of the publication he represents. You can see the hat-wearing gentlemen of the British

newspapers, the scowling turbaned hocas of the conservative Turkish press, the three-headed

figure of the Greek journal Neologos, and a crowd of other French, Greek, Armenian and

Bulgarian journalists, all regarding the newcomer with a mix of aggression, alarm, and

amusement. The figure in the donkey ears is of course Garabed Panosian.

[Kasap’s critics, and his response]

Besides the fellow Christians who were subject to his mockery, Kasap irritated plenty of

conservative Muslim journalists for whom his Christian status made him suspect. The very first

play that he staged, an adaptation of Molière’s 1668 comedy The Miser, encountered criticism

even before its debut from the newspaper Basiret. The author, known as Basiretçi Ali Efendi,

questioned Kasap’s decision to name his adaptation Pinti Hamid (“Stingy Hamid”), which he

interpreted as a gratuitous slur against Muslims. In response, Kasap published the full article

critiquing his choice, and interspersing his own indignant humorous retorts. In response to the

question, “Why Hamid?” he explained, “because Stingy Hamid is a well-known figure in stories,
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whose name appears in proverbs about miserliness, that's why.” Where the author suggested that

Kasap had “neglected to consider that one can find plenty of misers with the names Nikola or

Petro,” Kasap replied, “How could I have neglected to consider it? I considered it, but I feared

that if I should use the names Nikola or Petro, as you say, you would criticize me saying, “Why

isn't he called Istefan or Artin?” In any case, there are misers in every millet. Ottomans will not

be fooled by this sort of sycophancy.” 10

Kasap’s rebuttal strenuously attests to a familiarity with Ottoman culture shared between

himself and his readers, a culture that not only extends to non-Muslim communities but that

features their rivalries as familiar tropes available for humor. His confidence in his readers’

appreciation of this kind of ethnic humor strengthens his assertion that “Ottomans will not be

fooled” by Basiret’s attempt at Christian-baiting. In effect, he is asking his diverse readership to

support him in bearing witness to the existence of an Ottoman cultural heritage that is the shared

property of multiple millets. The social identity of a reader who recognized himself as part of this

public was a necessary precursor to the formation of a political identity amenable to a multi-

confessional empire with political representation of Muslims and non-Muslims alike.

[Slide X: cover of Hayâl]

The last example I want to show you is from Kasap’s third major newspaper venture, the journal

Hayâl, which had the largest circulation and was supposedly published in no fewer than five

different language editions: Turkish, Greek, Bulgarian, and Armenian, and French.11

10 Çıngıraklı Tatar No. 2, 29 Mart 1289 [10 April 1873]; original article in Basiret No. 895, 25 Mart 1289 [6 April
1873]; cited in Kudret, “Teodor Kasap,” 19.
11
“MF.MKT 14/139: Ruhsat for Kasap to Open Hayal Press - Dec. 2, 1873,” December 2, 1873, MF.MKT 14/139,
BOA.
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[Slide XI: Hacivat and Karagöz]

This journal embraced as its mascots the legendary Ottoman humor duo, Hacivat and

Karagöz. These two figures from the Anatolian shadow-puppetry tradition mark a considerable

step down from the lofty plane of ancient Greek philosophy and even from the middle-brow

reference to a French court jester. And yet Kasap used these humble figures to express his most

sophisticated and amusing commentary yet. These are the figures who starred in the cartoon that

led to Kasap’s arrest and the eventual end of his career as a journalist.

[Slide XII: Karagöz in chains]

Here we see the simple, untutored Karagöz in chains, and the know-it-all snob Hacivat

lecturing him, setting him up for the most momentous punchline of Kasap’s career. Hacivat says,

“What is this state you’re in, Karagöz?” To which Karagöz replies, “It’s freedom within the

limits of the law, Hacivat!”

[Conclusion]

In jail, Kasap was reunited with his old friend Namik Kemal. While Kemal was there for his role

in drafting the Ottoman constitution that sought to politically constitute a nation, Kasap was

there for his role in constituting it culturally. Kasap’s work in creating a unified public through

words and images was a necessary antecedent for the work of drafting the constitution, and it

may have had the more lasting legacy. After all, it took relatively little effort – just a few

executions and expulsions – to render the constitution a dead letter, while it took decades of

escalating state violence against minorities and the deliberate cultivation of an exclusivist

Muslim identity and for the spirit of Ottomanism to fade.