AHMET MİTHAT EFENDİ’S NOVEL AUTHORS

This study aims to briefly discuss novelists referred by Ahmet Mithat Efendi by revealing the resources in his novels by scanning all his novels. After scanning through his novels, it was observed that he referred to other novelists in his novels; namely, Demir Bey Yahut İnkişaf-ı Esrar, Ahmet Metin ve Şirzat Yahut Roman İçinde Roman, Mesail-i Muğlaka, Henüz On Yedi Yaşında, Karnaval, Paris’te Bir Türk, Yeryüzünde Bir Melek, Cellât, Cinli Han, Diplomalı Kız, Haydut Montari, Müşahedat, Fenni Bir Roman Yahut Amerika Doktorları and Taaffüf. Majority of these references was from Western novelists while only references to Eastern novelists were in Taaffüf. This observation is quite expected considering how new this novel movement was and texts from Western resources were used for the formation of the novels. Ahmet Mithat Efendi refers to other novelists when he aims to support his arguments and/or to provide an example. However, he occasionally uses references to show his admiration to the novelists. He only does not admire Emile Zola and novelists from the same movement. Moreover, he does not hesitate to use his novels and protagonists for introducing and depicting his characters as he did in Mesail-i Muğlaka. Novelists that were referred by Ahmet Mithat Efendi can be listed as; Alexandre Dumas Pere, Emile Zola, Jean Jacques Rousseau, Miguel de Cervantes, Honore de Balzac, Paul de Kock, Octave Feuillet, Jules Verne, Alexandre Dumas Fils, Xavier de Montepin, George Sand, Daniel Defoe, Lev Tolstoy, Rene de Chateaubriand, Emile Gaboriau, Richebourg, Yusuf Kamil Paşa, Aziz Efendi. It is also known that the novelist supporting his oeuvre did also shaped Turkish literary during Tanzimat era.