AN AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL APPROACH TO AHMET MİTHAT’S NOVEL FELATUN BEY and RAKIM EFENDİ

Abstract

Autobiography is the narration of one’s own life by himself/herself. A man who tells his own life heads towards his own self.
Therefore, autobiographies are also called as “self-narrative”. When autobiography uses the techniques of novel genre, the
output is an autobipgraphical novel. Thus, life story of a real person becomes a fictional narrative. An author constantly, openly
or secretly add something from himself/herself when creating a narrative. It demonstrates that there is a flow between novel
and autobiography which is mostly from autobiography to novel.
Ahmet Mithat’s novel Felatun Bey ile Rakım Efendi provide details about the author’s life. The novel Felatun Bey ile Rakım
Efendi can be viewed from an autobiographical perspective since one of the main characters Rakım Efendi and the author
Ahmet Mithat share a number of similarities, and the novel contains sequences from the author’s life, his feeling and thoughts.
In the introduction of this study, there is a general evaluation of autobiography and autobiographical novel in Turkish literature.
In the second chapter, the autobiographical openings in Ahmet Mithat’s novel Felatun Bey ile Rakım Efendi are discussed