Abstract:

Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906) is one of the leading playwrights whose fame was not limited to Norway, but spread throughout the world. His major plays which are performed all over the world include Peer Gyn, Hedda Gabler, Wild Duck, A Doll’s House, Builder Solness. Considered one of the pioneers of modern drama, Ibsen is also regarded as one of the important representatives of the realism movement in the theater. With the Tanzimat period, westernization became the official policy of the state, and distinguished theater works of the west began to be translated into Turkish in the way of creating a western-style theatre. In line with this understanding, efforts were made to translate Ibsen's plays into Turkish and stage them in local theaters. In consequence of that, many Turkish playwrights were influenced by Ibsen, and Çetin Altan (1927-2015), a prominent name of the Turkish literature in the Republican period, was one of them. Çetin Altan (1927-2015) produced many literary works such as novels, poems, essays and detectives, and made his name known in the literary world with his plays. Almost all the plays of Altan, who wrote eleven plays in total, had the opportunity to be staged. Altan, who mostly dealt with social problems in his plays, just like in his newspaper articles, saw the theater as an effective tool for raising awareness. Altan's play Yedinci Köpek (1964), which he wrote with such a purpose, shows points of similarities with Henrik Ibsen’s An Enemy of The People (1882). When these two plays are compared, remarkable similarities are observed in terms of plots, characteristics and adventures of the protagonists. This study seeks to demonstrate the key similarities between the two plays.