I wanted to write something. I picked up paper and pen, and I walked out to the terrace. What I call terrace is on the top floor of the hotel where I live. The weather was spitefully tempting. A warm March sun penetrating all the way to your bones. Weather like this makes many a person happy at the end of winter. What is happiness? Has everyone in the world known it? Questions like this can be debated at length. Who knows, maybe if I did debate this one, I would take back what I said. So what if I imagine myself to be happy every once in a while? Since it seems certain that I won’t be getting my share of great fortune, I’ll make do with whatever comes my way.
I took a seat. I started thinking about what to write. I wonder if I should write a story. Lately, some people have been saying that the plot of a story is not that important. But regardless of that, something needs to happen in a story. The event must have a beginning and an end. On top of that, it shouldn’t be one of those tedious events of which we’ve all grown weary. Everyone is fed up with the stories that chronicle the life of the petty bourgeoisie, treating its weaknesses and banalities as if these were the greatest virtues of humanity or the world’s most dignified ventures. All agony comes from love. But then, there is the agony of the millions—billions. Unfortunately, we know nothing of these masses. We’ve got ourselves in with the petty bourgeoisie, we’re rolling along, although we know perfectly well that we belong in a different society, a different class. Our worries are not the worries of the people we associate with. We’re not after money or wealth. Just a few days ago, I overheard a woman. “In my opinion, poetry,” she said, “is a white automobile.” We, pitiful beings unable to look out for even the least of our own interests, how on earth can we become one of these people? We belong to that huge class that we know nothing about—the poor. But we can’t talk about them or their lives, because we’re not familiar with them. Besides, it would be a dangerous business. People are quick to call you a leftist or a communist these days. The best thing a writer can do is to only write things that won’t stir up any trouble. That is what I’m about to do.
The sky was blue, a bright blue. The sun got warmer and warmer. “I wonder if I should write an article” I thought. Something has been troubling me lately. The issue of réalisme. We should no longer be thinking of réalisme the way we did in the nineteenth century.
The terrace I was sitting on faced the backs of the apartment buildings across the way. Those buildings also had terraces. Something caught my eye on one of them. A woman was sitting at a table, one arm resting on it, her head bent over her lap, preoccupied. She must have been sifting through rice. She must be a maid, I said to myself. Yes, yes, surely she is a maid. She’s dressed like a maid. Don’t think for a moment that I say this because I look down on maids. I only mean that she was wearing work clothes, that’s all. Otherwise, I know how well-mannered the maids of the petty bourgeoisie can be. They often outdo their masters and mistresses when it comes to etiquette. I stood up and started pacing around. I came all the way to the edge of the terrace. Down in the garden, on a wall, five cats had surrounded another one, wailing and yowling, flicking their tails. The one in the center ought to be a female, and the others, males. It must be that cats sense the spring before humans. Just then, two children appeared out of nowhere, carrying baskets on their backs. They must have been errand boys from the bazaar. Their clothes were in tatters. How did they get into the garden? The landlord had ordered some coal to be poured on the path that leads to the gate. So that the residents won’t get mud on their shoes, I guess. The children must have sneaked in to steal some coal. These urchins don’t know the way of the world. On the one hand, you have thousands who are without heat in the freezing cold, on the other, a handful of people think nothing of wasting coal to keep their shoes clean. This is the way things are. It’ll never change. This is how it is all over the world.
The woman on the other terrace had noticed neither the cats nor the children. She just kept sifting through the rice. Perhaps, she sensed her limbs loosen with pleasure under the spring sun and her body perspire delightfully here and there. Who knows what went on in her mind? At some point, she stood up and walked inside, leaving the rice on the table. She was young, too. She had an unruly body that stretched the seams of her dress. Surely, she also felt the spring. What a terrible affair this is, spring.
I must write something. Let’s get back to the problem of réalisme. At this point in history, we must think of réalisme differently. A work of art will not become réaliste just because it’s filled with the world’s most hideous facts. Writers who attempt to bring to life poverty, misery, and class inequality in all their glory often fall into hyperbole. As far as I’m concerned, watching the world only through dark glasses, holding up the magnifying glass only to squalor is romantisme itself. Twentieth-century man no longer has the luxury of being romantique. We can only serve society if we make ourselves believable. We cannot simply distinguish a réaliste writer from a romantique one based on subject matter either. Because, there is no such thing on earth as a réaliste event or a romantique event. Only the writer’s craft can establish his literary identity.
The woman came back out on the terrace carrying a bowl. She walked over to the table and poured the rice into the bowl. Then, she put her hand in and started mixing it around. I think she was washing the rice. She still had no inkling of the cats or the errand boys. Just a moment ago, I said that these children don’t know the way of the world. Wrong! They know it all too well. What is the order of the world? A wise man called it! “If it weren’t for the rich,” he said, “the poor would be worse off.” True! These urchins have known this since the day they were born. Have they ever thought, “What would happen to the rich if it weren’t for the poor?” They wouldn’t dare.
I walked back to the edge and looked down again. There were fewer cats now. One of them had grabbed a hold of the female’s nape with its mouth and wouldn’t let go. On the other side, the boys were still busy picking up the coal. All of a sudden, a black dog dashed out of the building and started barking at the boys. Not because they were taking the coal. A dog doesn’t care about getting mud on its feet. It was just making a racket because of the children’s ragged clothes. That’s how polite folks’ dogs are. They don’t like unkempt people. Just like their owners.
The children were startled at first. But they didn’t seem too concerned. I kept watching them, curious to see what would happen next, whether they would run away.
Just then, the woman on the terrace walked to the edge with the rice bowl. She held one hand to the rim to keep the rice from falling and poured the water out into the yard. The water fell from the sixth floor and landed forcefully right between the children and the dog. Neither the children nor the dog or the cats were expecting that. They scattered in a flash, without waiting to see what was going on.
Something like this could really have happened, couldn’t it? Of course it could, why wouldn’t it? But it didn’t. I made it all up.
***
Orhan Veli Kanık (1914-1950) is among the best-loved and most-quoted Turkish poets. Along with Oktay Rifat and Melih Cevdet Anday, he lead the Garip movement in poetry, championing simple language and free-form composition. Orhan Veli’s poems are minimalist, humorous, and bittersweet. Like his poems, his prose is marked by his interest in the insignificant and the marginalized, and by his wry, contrarian voice.
Selin Gökçesu is a Brooklyn-based writer and MFA student in Columbia University’s nonfiction program with a concentration in literary translation. She translates short stories and fairy tales from the Turkish.
“Spring’s Doings” is published by permission of Yapı Kredi Publications. Copyright © Yapı Kredi Kültür Sanat Yayıncılık Ticaret ve Sanayi A.Ş. 2012 (foreignrights@ykykultur.com.tr)