Ottoman Salonika
i Edeb, again promoting a traditional / modern binary, while adding its
political importance. He writes, “At the early age of seventeen [his fa-
ther], with a few friends of his age, had taken the initiative of establish-
ing a literary weekly, Gonce-i-Edeb, which took a veiled stand against the
conservative world.”^88 Ahmet Emin Yalman’s father’s progressive literary
weekly Mütalâa included poems such as “What Is the Use?” Because the
palace asked what the use of schools, books, science, hospitals and facto-
ries was, the author asked what the use was of having despotic rule, which
meant darkness, slavery, misery and humiliation. Yalman, who had been
a student at Terakki, which he called a “progressive school,” boasts: “This
autographed poem soon disappeared. I hid it so that I, too, could have
a revolutionary secret. I rejoiced in being the possessor of a ‘pernicious,
dangerous paper.’ I soon gave up all sorts of games and concentrated my
whole interest on publishing a weekly paper of my own. I named it The
Intention and spent my holidays in writing it by hand.... I was car-
ried away by the revolutionary undercurrents.”^89 A cousin of his mother’s
was sent into political exile for opposing the sultan.^90 Yalman’s father was
forced to close Mütalâa that same year, and moved his family to Istan-
bul.^91 The Karakaş Feyziye school produced Çocuk Bahçesi (Kindergarten)
until 1908 ; thereafter, its name was changed to Bahçe (Garden), and it was
no longer for children. The pre- 1908 version was intended to be used in
the classroom and included writing from students including Sabiha, the
daughter of Nazmi Efendi (Sertel).^92 Although a children’s journal, it was
a mouthpiece for dissidents and included writing by famous adult writers
on political topics, including the negative effects of Abdülhamid II’s rule
on the empire. It faced the censor.^93 The Journal de Salonique noted that
it was suspended for disregarding his warnings.^94
Religious Actors and Societal Transformation
Because the Dönme schools were their only institutions to have sur-
vived (although transferred and transformed to suit other aims in the
Turkish Republic), Turkish public memory focuses on their legacy. It
is their depiction that represents much of what is remembered of the
Dönme. The public recollections of those who attended Şemsi Efendi’s
first school and the histories written by those affiliated with the two
later schools established by Dönme emphasize the themes of modernity,
progress, and revolutionary thought. What they do not mention in their