THE THEME OF DESPERATE LOVE IN GOETHE’S THE SORROWS OF YOUNG WERTHER AND MEHMET RAUF’S EYLUL

In this study, Goethe’s The Sorrows of Young Werther and Mehmet Rauf’s Eylül, which were written in different centuries, will be compared in relation to the theme of desperate love. The aim of the study is to reveal that the theme of desperate love was handled in different periods and cultures almost with no difference due to literary and cultural interaction. The use of the theme of desperate love in Eylül shows that the same theme can be handled with the same emotional intensity and liveliness although about 150 years passed after Young Werther had been written. Therefore, in the study, the theme of desperate love will be dealt with in relation to the relationships of the individuals with each other in a love triangle. Also, their influences in the birth of a desperate love and their ideas about each other and finally the ends of the desperate love stories in both novels will be discussed. For this purpose, firstly the great influence of the translation works -translated from French to Turkish- on the Turkish writers of the Servet-i Fünun period in which Eylül was written, will be mentioned. After That, the two works will be handled in relation to the terms of “affecting” and “affected” which are the determining terms in the interaction process. Eventually, in this context the place and the importance of the two works -Goethe’s The Sorrows of Young Werther as the affecting work and Eylül as the affected work- for this study will be expressed.