Ahmet Tanpinar - A Mind at Peace

No, Suad had no admiration for Mümtaz. Because he accepted responsibility for his thoughts. But were the porter’s wife and children amenable? His thoughts roamed through the mean and constricting corners of the city, through the mud-brick hovels on streets flowing with filthy water. Why? So their grandchildren might be content and comfortable. . But the porter’s wife wasn’t willing. Wearing the gaudy wedding gown that he’d seen that morning in a flea market shopwindow, she begged of Mümtaz, Don’t send him off! Don’t send him! If he goes, what will become of me and the children? Who’ll take care of us? And she wept at his feet in the gown purchased from a discounter. On the way here he’d seen new conscripts at the Sirkeci train station, inductees who hadn’t yet been issued uniforms. Accompanying them were young fiancées and mothers holding the hands of their children, all walking in tears.

I do take responsibility for my ideas. Had Suad heard this sentence, he would have keeled over in laughter, “Which ideas, my dear Mümtaz?” But Suad was of a different stripe. He never did like me. He never did take me seriously. Yet I can’t help but like him.

Did he truly like Suad? Had he truly liked anybody, ever? The fact was that Nuran had left him; she didn’t have a single decent thought for him. İhsan was ill while Mümtaz aimlessly wandered the city streets. Macide forced me, Suad. She said, “Don’t come home before dark! Go out and get some air, otherwise you’ll fall ill as well! I can’t look after you, too!” He’d been reduced to defending himself before the judgment of a corpse.

He wiped his brow with a hand. Why am I so obsessed with him anyway? He tried not to think about Suad. He wanted to remember a time before all this, a period of trivial and blithe concerns.

“Best not to think about anything!” He hastily passed through the Kazanci market. He walked before Istanbul University’s dental school, scattering the covey of pigeons that he’d fed that very morning. Then he crossed the square. He strode apace by café tables beneath the sprawling chestnut to avoid being stopped by an acquaintance and entered the Beyazıt Mosque courtyard. He glanced at the clock out of the corner of his eye: ten to six. They must have arrived by now!

Two elderly men took ablution at the mosque fountain. Which of the prayers will they perform? A disheveled elderly woman wearing a black chador crouched, cooling herself by awkwardly bringing a palmful of water to her face. Her shriveled hands appeared to be roasted by fire. Stray pigeons dawdled atop the marble slabs of the courtyard as if roaming through a garden of abstraction. “Like the beloveds in old miniatures. .” Annoyed with himself, he struck out this comparison uttered in Suad’s voice: Not even close! If anything, they’re thoughts wandering through a mind in solitude. . This wasn’t accurate either; they’re inklings before the onset of actual thought . Voilà! Pigeons on the portico traced mysterious shapes through ephemeral flights of lacey design.

By the other courtyard gate, he again observed elderly men performing ablutions and the expanse of the quadrangle. As Yahya Kemal had put it, this space had been an open casement for the soul since the mosque had been founded in 1506. This was what should persist. I wonder if women in chador would come here in the past? But this wasn’t the only transformation. As he’d passed through the courtyard he’d noticed a lone electric bulb burning as if to augment the dimness of the mosque from beneath the thick, half-raised entryway drape. Old men performing the ablution at a classical mosque. .

Everything that might be termed national is a thing of beauty. . and must persist eternally.

Then, thinking of the porter, he again retorted: Don’t think I’m making wagers on your head! I’m also speaking on behalf of your convictions.

This time the porter wasn’t alone. He’d been joined by Mehmet, who’d been doing his military service in Ereǧli, and the coffeehouse apprentice at Boyacıköy.

Outside the entryway another elderly woman begged for alms in a thick Rumeli accent, though in a gentle voice. She had small hands, as small as a child’s. Her eyes resembled mountain springs on her wizened face. As Mümtaz handed the woman money, he wanted to peer into her eyes. But he could discern nothing there — such had they been occluded by pain and longing. Next he stopped in front of the prayer-bead seller peddling the final and paltry mementos of his boyhood Thousand and One Nights Ramadan celebrations, having reduced this realm of his genesis to a few prayer beads and two or three misvak toothbrush sticks in a small case. Last August, he and Nuran had purchased two strings of prayer beads and chatted with the man. He again bought two strings; but was scarcely able to keep them out of Suad’s clutch. I’m dreaming, I’m seeing things while wide awake. .

By viscous light of summer twilight the coffeehouse seethed in sound and fury. A gathering of every ilk and class — including expectant ferry-goers, neighborhood locals soon to return home, and day-trippers chatting with friends after the beach — had braved the evening sun filtering through the acacias like the fourteen children of Princess Niobe and were discussing the current state of affairs: They display a true heroic resilience in this sun! Virtually Homeric.

Mümtaz walked on as the names of Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, and Chamberlain flitted through the air. While passing one table, he overheard the vociferous commentary of an acquaintance: “My dear man, today’s France can’t fight. Its inhabitants have become decadent. . One and all they’re like André Gide. .”

A las Gide, alas France! If France can’t fight, of course it isn’t Gide’s fault. There must be other reasons! That this man could today still recollect a France without Gide was truly bizarre. Mümtaz immediately thought of a book comprised of comments and predictions made at each café table. What a testimonial. To simply convey opinions on the verge of war — if it comes to that! Read after the fact, it’d be an accurate and fascinating record of the vagaries of human thought. But documented in the thick of things. . it ought to be written tonight! Should these same citizens later try to write down what they’d honestly thought now, intervening events would distort their state of mind and perspective. Because we change along with events; and as we change, we reconstruct our histories anew. The human mind functioned like this. Humanity would continually reformulate time. The knife’s edge of the present carried the weight of history while also transforming it, word by word.

Prophecies of other voices rose from other tables: “My good man, England isn’t as weak as you might suppose” or, “You’ll see, the actual victor will be Mussolini! The man could be in Paris in twenty-four hours!”

Mümtaz was transported to the era described by Cabî İsmet Bey in his history of the reign of Sultan Selim III: “The general known to the world as Bonaparte sent word, ‘whoever be my sultan, I shall come to his aid with an army that could fill the Seven Seas. .’” Of course, it wasn’t quite the same, but reminiscent of what he heard. The commentaries continued: “At the turn of the nineteenth century, we were experiencing a crisis with Europe similar to today’s. But back then we weren’t familiar with Europe or ourselves”; “How much this country has sacrficed in blood”; “In place of supporting France, if only we hadn’t left England’s side”; “But, my good man, history is done and over with.” At what lengths he’d discussed such matters with İhsan. İhsan, who lay ailing.