Aliye, Fatima (1862–1936)
Aliye, Fatima (1862–1936)
Turkish author who wrote novels and translated French textbooks from multiple disciplines into Turkish. Name variations: Fatma Aliye, Fatima Aliya. Born in 1862 in Turkey; died in 1936 in Turkey; daughter of Ahmad Cevdet (or Gaudat) Pasha; educated at home; married a Turkish army officer.
Selected works:
Muhadarat (1892); History of Women of Islam (1892); Mercy (1898); Udi, the Lute Player (1899); Biographies of Philosophers (1900).
As the daughter of statesman and historian Ahmad Cevdet Pasha, Fatima Aliye was privileged to receive a superior education at home, which included a thorough study in the language and literature of France. As a teenager, she married a Turkish army officer, with whom she traveled to his various postings. She translated French texts from the sciences and arts and used her position as a member of the governing class to impress upon others the need to educate men and women alike. While Aliye wrote in Turkish, her own well-received work was of the French tradition and encompassed fiction and nonfiction. Among her publications were a biography of her father and a History of Women of Islam (1892). Though Aliye continued to write and speak out through the early 1900s, with the fall of the Ottoman Empire in 1919 her literary voice was silenced. She lived in Turkey until her death in 1936.
Crista Martin , Boston, Massachusetts