 |
| Ismail Gasprinskiy in his office in Bakchiseray. |
Recently, as
they do every year, the library celebrated the anniversary of the birth of
Ismail Gasprinskiy (March 21, 1851). The day began with a ceremony of tributes
at the Gasprinskiy monument located on the Salgir River in the center of
Simferopol. A two-hour seminar on Gasprinskiy’s life and work was held at the Franco
Library, and on the following day, a celebration was held in the nearby city of
Bakchiseray, where Gasprinskiy lived for most of his life and where he is
buried.
The
festivities made me think once again about this remarkable man and how so
little is known of him in the western world. And perhaps because I am currently
showing the recent PBS special on the history of the American women’s movement
to students at the Window on America Center in Simferopol, I also thought about
Gasprinskiy’s views on women and how he truly is someone we would call a “feminist.”
At a time
when women were almost universally seen as inferior to men, particularly in the
Muslim world, Gasprinskiy had the courage to speak out, demanding to be heard
on the importance of changing the attitude towards and treatment of women. In
the pages of his newspaper Terdjiman
which he published from 1887 until his death in 1914, Gasprinskiy criticized
the practice of polygamy and arranged marriages and divorce being a prerogative
for men only. Edward Lazzerini, the foremost western scholar on Ismail
Gasprinskiy, writes that “Gasprinskii insisted that ‘evolution in the marriage
laws’ had become a necessity” and Gasprinskii felt that “what was needed…was a
regularization of the laws so that men would no longer be able to repudiate
their wives arbitrarily, and women would be permitted to divorce their husband
for just cause.”
His own
marriage to Bibi-Zuhre hanim Akchurina seemed to have been a partnership in the
modern sense: “the union of two determined young people who valued the role
education could play in the enlightenment of the Muslims of the Russian empire
and who were ready to dedicate their energies to achieve this goal,” writes Azade-Ayse Rorlich, translator and editor of
the only book of Gasprinskiy’s writings available in English. Zuhre hanim played a vital role in the
publication of Ismail Gasprinskiy’s renowned newspaper, Terdjiman, according to Rorlich:
“Even though her name did not appear in the paper… Terjuman would have
neither become a reality, nor endured, had it not been for the material and
moral support of his wife Zuhre, as well as for her very real contribution to
running the paper.”
Perhaps
what Gasprinskiy is most known for is his belief in the importance of the
education of Muslim women. In his words: “Whoever loves his own people and
wishes it a great future, must concern himself with the enlightenment and
education for women, restore freedom and independence to them, and give wide
scope to the development of their mind and capabilities.”
He was
quick to publicize any evidence of attempts to improve education for Muslim
women, such as the opening of schools especially for girls. In Bakchiseray, his
sister opened the first school for girls of the new method schools
(Gasprinskiy’s modernization of Muslim education which was widespread across
the Russian empire). With his daughter Sefika, Gasprinskiy started the first
magazine devoted to Muslim women. And in his fiction writings, he often created
strong women characters that embodied his ideas of modern women, in the belief
that his writings would “inspire the real-life Muslim woman to utilize fully
her capabilities as a human being, and real-life Muslim society to permit her
the opportunity to do so.” (Lazzerini)
It was in
such writing that I came to see how well Gasprinskiy understood the role of
society in keeping women oppressed. French
and American Letters, the only collection of Gasprinskiy’s writings
available in an English translation, are excerpts from a fictional travelogue
that he serialized in Terdjiman. It
follows the adventures of a Muslim man from Central Asia and his travels to
France and Africa, and at least some of the writing is loosely based on
Gasprinskiy’s own life.
But the last letters are pure fantasy and recount his
and his travelling companions’ capture by a band of “Amazons” in Africa. In
this Amazon society, gender roles are reversed—men are sexual slaves, women are
rulers and warriors. There is much discussion among the men about this reversal
of roles and titillating humor when one of the captured men is summoned into
the “harem” of the Amazon sultana. In the end, the men escape but not before doing
fierce battle with the Amazons. Gasprinskiy writes:
“The
amazons flew toward our improvised fortification with extraordinary speed and
courage…the Frenchmen…marveled at the spirit and courage of these desert
riders. The life and courage of these
amazons… clearly proved that education and world views could endow women with
much courage, strength, and fortitude…It became clear that in other countries
women were fearful, weak, had a delicate nature, frail nerves and no will of
their own, not because that is how it should be, but because their education,
world view, and those life conditions which had shaped them over time, had made
them what they were. “
Truly,
Ismail Gasprinskiy was a man far ahead of his time. His radical view that women
are equal to men and it is society that is holding them back would resonate
today and earn him the label of “feminist.”
The
information for this blog post came from these sources:
Gasprali,
Ismail. French and African Letters,
Annotated Translation and Introduction by Azade-Ayse Rorlich, Istanbul: The
Isis Press. 2008
Lazzerini,
Edward. “Ismail Bey Gasprinskii and Muslim Modernism in Russia, 1871-1914,”
unpublished dissertation, University of Washington, 1973.
Fisher,
Alan. "A Model Leader for Asia. Ismail Gaspirali." In The
Tatars of Crimea: Return to the Homeland,
ed. Edward A. Allworth, Duke University Press, 1998.
Note: There
are many different spellings of Gasprinskiy, based on the translation of the
original language—Turkish, Russian, Crimean Tatar. I use the Crimean Tatar
translation.
