{"product_id":"workers-of-the-world-unite-rare-first-turkish-edition-of-the-communist-manifesto-قومونیست-بیاننامه‌سی-komunist-beyannamesi-i-e-the-communist-manifesto-translated-by-sefik-husnu-deymer","title":"“WORKERS OF THE WORLD, UNITE!” \/ RARE FIRST TURKISH EDITION OF THE COMMUNIST MANIFESTO] قومونیست بیاننامه‌سی \/ Komünist beyannâmesi [i.e., The Communist manifesto]. Translated by Sefik Hüsnü [Deymer]","description":"\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: black; mso-themecolor: text1;\"\u003eMARX, KARL (1818-1883) \u0026amp; ENGELS, FRIEDRICH (1820-1895).\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: black; mso-themecolor: text1;\"\u003eAydinlik Külliyâti No. 9 \/ Evkâf Matbaasi, Sehzâde Basi, Istanbul, AH 1339 = CE 1923. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003eOriginal stapled red wrappers feature an “Aydinlik” emblem on the front cover. Cr. 8vo. (19 x 13,5 cm). In Ottoman script (Old Turkish with Arabic letters). 52 p. Minor wear to the upper right corner and a small loss at the foot of the spine. Light foxing to a few internal pages. Otherwise, a fine copy.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003eExceedingly rare first Turkish edition in book form, of the Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei, representing the first Turkish translation of the work. It appeared shortly after the completion of its year-long serialization in Aydınlık, the first communist journal published in Turkey, which concluded in January 1923. The translation was prepared from the French edition of the Manifest by Şefik Hüsnü Deymer (1887-1959), founder of both Aydınlık and the Turkish Communist Party (TKP). Its publication marked a turning point in Şefik Hüsnü's political career, contributing significantly to his rapid rise, reputation within the Comintern, and establishing him in the eyes of the organization as one of the leading communist figures of the Eastern world. Together with the Persian (Tehran) and Azerbaijani (Baku) translations published in the same year, the present edition is one of the earliest translations of the \u003ci\u003eCommunist Manifesto\u003c\/i\u003e into any Middle Eastern language.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003eShortly after its publication, however, the work was confiscated during the 1923 Communist arrests (1923 Komünist Tevkifâtı), prohibited, and forced into the long period of illegality that would characterize virtually all left-wing publishing in Turkey. Although no source records its original print run, it was evidently produced in only a small edition and, following its suppression, circulated clandestinely for many years within communist intellectual circles. After Şefik Hüsnü was prosecuted under the Law on Treason to the Homeland (Hıyanet-i Vataniyye Kanunu) in 1925, all publications issued by Aydınlık were officially banned and systematically destroyed. The subsequent enactment of the Law on the Maintenance of Order (Takrir-i Sükûn Kanunu) reinforced these measures, resulting in the almost complete disappearance of the edition and explaining the extreme rarity of surviving copies today.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003eThe publication of the present edition in 1923 coincided with two other early translations of the Communist Manifesto in the Middle Eastern languages. In Baku, Halil Edhem published the first Azerbaijani Turkish translation in the same year, titled Komünist Beyannâmesi Manifesti, while in Tehran, Sayyid Muhammad Dehghan produced a Persian version, entitled Bayaniyih-yi Karl Marks, which appeared in the socialist newspaper Tufan. The latter drew partly upon an earlier, apparently lost Persian translation attributed to Biniyaz, but remained incomplete and was not published separately in book form. An Arabic translation attributed to Mikhail Attaya may have circulated shortly after the Russian Revolution of 1917, although its publication history remains uncertain; the first widely circulated Arabic translation appeared in 1933, prepared by the Syrian communist Khalid Bakdash. Although the chronological precedence of the 1923 Turkish, Azerbaijani, and Persian publications remains uncertain, together, these publications contributed to the early spread of the Communist Manifesto across the region.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003eŞefik Hüsnü Deymer (1887-1959) was a Turkish physician, Marxist intellectual, translator, and one of the leading figures of the early communist movement in Turkey. Educated in medicine in Paris, where he encountered French socialism and attended meetings addressed by Jean Jaurès, he contributed to the socialist newspaper \u003ci\u003eL'Humanité\u003c\/i\u003e before returning to the Ottoman Empire. In 1919, he co-founded the Workers' and Peasants' Socialist Party of Turkey and subsequently established close ties with the Communist International (Comintern). He founded the influential Marxist periodical \u003ci\u003eAydınlık\u003c\/i\u003e in 1921 and translated Marx and Engels's \u003ci\u003eCommunist Manifesto\u003c\/i\u003e into Turkish in 1922. His international political activities included participation in the founding congress of the French Communist Party at Tours in 1920, the Balkan Communist Federation Conference in Sofia in 1922, and the Fourth Comintern Congress in Moscow later that year. Elected to the Comintern's Control Commission in 1924 and its Executive Committee in 1928, he subsequently worked in Berlin with the Comintern's Western European Bureau under Georgi Dimitrov and was involved in the Anti-Imperialist League. Following the Reichstag fire in 1933, he was arrested by the Nazi authorities but released several months later. He remained an important figure in the Turkish communist movement despite repeated imprisonment and periods of exile.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cb\u003eNOTES ON RARITY\u003c\/b\u003e: Advertisements for this exceedingly rare pamphlet appeared in Aydınlık immediately after the completion of its serialization. The contemporary advertised price was just 10 kuruş, deliberately kept low to make the publication affordable to shipyard and factory workers, the primary audience the publishers sought to reach.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003eConsequently, institutional holdings are exceptionally scarce. Even during the anti-communist purges of the 1950s, the book continued to be treated by the Turkish authorities as prohibited organizational literature and was frequently seized as primary ideological evidence in political prosecutions. It was also officially listed among the twelve communist publications subject to confiscation under Turkish law.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: black; mso-themecolor: text1;\"\u003eProvenance:\u003c\/span\u003e \u003c\/b\u003eFrom the collection of\u003cb\u003e \u003c\/b\u003eIhsan Sabri Çaglayangil (1908-1993). Acquired by C. I.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"MsoNormal\"\u003eÖzege 11121. As of July 2026, OCLC \u0026amp; KvK reveal the sole copy worldwide at the Orient-Institut of Istanbul (OCLC 1030747727).\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Khalkedon Rare Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":67912982167683,"sku":null,"price":16000.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0390\/3294\/6819\/files\/14_4306e8ec-a846-47b5-9e5d-f397dd473ca9.jpg?v=1792172590","url":"https:\/\/khalkedonrarebooks.com\/products\/workers-of-the-world-unite-rare-first-turkish-edition-of-the-communist-manifesto-%d9%82%d9%88%d9%85%d9%88%d9%86%db%8c%d8%b3%d8%aa-%d8%a8%db%8c%d8%a7%d9%86%d9%86%d8%a7%d9%85%d9%87%e2%80%8c%d8%b3%db%8c-komunist-beyannamesi-i-e-the-communist-manifesto-translated-by-sefik-husnu-deymer","provider":"Khalkedon Rare Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}