Abstract:

The aim of this study is to analyze the illustrated entertainment books with some scientific contents within the context of translation studies as Musavver Fennî Eğlenceler-1 (1309 [1891]), Musavver Fennî Eğlenceler-2 (1310 [1892]) and Musavver Yeni Fennî Eğlenceler (1322 [1904]) which entered into Ottoman culture from French culture with a notable contribution of translations rendered by Avanzade Mehmed Süleyman. Avanzade Mehmed Süleyman (1871-1922) having a variety of professions such as pharmacist, journalist, author and translator presented various original and translated works into Turkish cultural and literary system. When the Turkish translation history is examined, it is clearly seen that lots of works from French culture and literature that had emphases on “science”, “entertainment”, “education” etc. entered into our literary system within the framework of Western-oriented modernization. Hundreds of literary and scientific works from Western culture, especially from French culture, had initially been translated into Ottoman Turkish and thus had penetrated into Ottoman culture earlier whereas certain genres namely drama and novel were introduced to Turkish society later via translations between the Tanzimat Period and the Alphabet Reform. Fennî eğlenceler (scientific entertainments) translated by Avanzade Mehmed Süleyman was among the abovementioned early genres to be introduced to Turkish people. The translator aimed to teach people, as can be understood from the titles of the books, rather than just to amuse Turkish readers in their free time. In this study, the main problem beside this analysis is the lack of transcriptions of the aforementioned works and the assessment of these works in the context of Translation Studies with the point of education while attaching importance to the “science” aspect. The transcription of the works will be realized and some examples extracted from the target text will be given in order to form the scope of this paper. “Skopos Theory” put forward by the German researcher Hans J. Vermeer will serve as the theoretical basis for the analysis of the translated entertainment books with scientific contents. Within the scope of “Skopos Theory”, the analysis to be made considering the aspects of Translation Studies, will be based especially on the concepts of “translation task, commissioner, purpose” within the framework of the article entitled “Skopos and Commission in Translational Action” by Vermeer (1989: 173-200). 

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