Argentine hero Martin Fierro meets Turkish readers

[Dave Monroe]

Argentine writer Jose Hernandez's epic poem "Martin Fierro," the pride
of Argentinean gaucho literature, is finally ready to enter the
libraries of Turkish bookworms, some 130 years after it was published
in 1872.

The Turkish translation of "Martin Fierro," produced with the
initiative of Spain's Cervantes Institute and the Argentinean Embassy
in Ankara, was launched at the institute in İstanbul last week. The
book's Turkish translators, Ertuğrul Önalp and Mehmet Necati Kutlu of
Ankara University's Spanish language and literature department, are
both scholars of the Spanish language.

Argentinean Ambassador to Turkey Sebastian L. Brugo Marco, in a speech
he delivered at the celebration of the book's launching, said the
book's translation was "a fastidious process," adding that they chose
to publish the book in both Spanish and Turkish to contribute to
mutual cultural relations between the two countries. "I wanted it to
be translated into Turkish because I wanted Turkish people to have the
possibility of knowing Argentina and the Argentinean people," the
ambassador told Today's Zaman.

The 2,316-line epic poem was originally published in two parts: "El
Gaucho Martín Fierro" in 1872 and "La Vuelta de Martín Fierro" in
1879. The poem provides a historical reference for the contributions
of gauchos -- South American cowboys -- to Argentina's national
development, as they played a major role in the country's independence
from Spain.

Hernandez was an intellectual journalist who lived among gauchos in
the peaceful areas of Argentina far from the ambitions of urban life
right before writing "Martin Fierro." The poem, which can be
considered as a protest against the Europeanizing inclinations of
Argentina's then-President Domingo Faustino Sarmiento (1811-1888),
elaborates the historical facts related to gauchos. The poem, which is
full of rural Argentinean terminology, is a hallmark of Argentinean
national identity and Martin Fierro is a national hero with whom much
of Argentina's rural population still empathizes. It has appeared in
hundreds of editions and it has been translated into around 40
languages -- among which Turkish is now included.

The book also made many contributions to world literary tradition and
popular culture. In the 1920s Jose Luis Borges and other avant-garde
Argentine writers published a magazine called "Martin Fierro." Also,
in Thomas Pynchon's novel "Gravity's Rainbow" a group of Argentine
anarchists led by Francisco Squalidozzi collaborate with a sinister
German filmmaker, Gerhardt von Göll, to create a film version of
Martin Fierro.

http://www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/detaylar.do?load=detay&link=129725