turkish → English transcript

There was a movement that said, "We are cleansing it of foreign elements, pure Turkish, we are creating a language," and a "massacre of Turkish" served this.

Now, I mean, for example, the word "üzüntü" has come to cover everything; I mean, if I just nick my finger, I’m sad; my father dies, I’m sad—it’s very different.

However, here—let me go with "melal," I mean "melil," "mahsun," for example—the sorrow of love is something else; I mean, it is "gam."

In one case it is "yeis," it is "fesür"; I mean, to convey sorrow—specific, particular states—now there used to be a different word each time; now all those particular states have disappeared.

I mean, you grieve at the death of someone very close to you whom you love, and you also feel sad because a splinter got stuck in your foot—I mean, they’re not the same thing, are they?

If only--I mean--we hadn't been so cruel to that language--I mean, the one we call Ottoman Turkish, that rich Arabic fused with Persian; maybe that language was actually enough for us to express everything.