The Homeland, or Silistra

The director of the performance is Nevena Miteva, the set design and costumes are by Nikolai Ninov, and the composer is Georgi Garchov.

Choreography: Stefan Stanchev

Consultants: Valentin Petkov and Vladimir Bryazov

The cast includes the actors Simona Todorova, Aleksandar Pavlov, Stanislav Georgiev, Elena Keshisheva, Miroslav Petrov, Stefan Stanchev, Nedyalko Nedelchev, Deyan Todorov, Yulian Rusev, and Iliyan Iliev.

For Namık Kemal, theatre is very important as a means of reaching the audience directly. In the play The Homeland, or Silistra, he seeks to convey to people the idea of and love for the homeland, setting this love against all kinds of feelings so that, in the end, it prevails over them all.

During the years of the Crimean War, the new love affair between Zekiye Hanım and Ismail Bey takes an unexpected turn when Ismail Bey goes to the front, and Zekiye, disguised as a soldier, follows him and joins the defense of Silistra. Thus, events unfold on the battlefield in which love, patriotism, and the idea of a nation are intertwined.

Namık Kemal was an Ottoman democrat, writer, intellectual, reformer, journalist, playwright, and political activist. He was born in Tekirdağ on December 21, 1840. In his youth, Kemal traveled throughout the Ottoman Empire, staying in Constantinople, Kars, and Sofia, and studied a range of subjects, including poetry. After joining the Young Ottomans in 1862, Kemal continuously wrote essays on political, administrative, social, and foreign policy reforms. As a result of his criticism of the government, Namık Kemal was exiled from the Ottoman Empire in 1867 and fled to Paris.

In 1869 or 1870, Kemal was allowed to return to Constantinople, and during this period he wrote his most important and influential work—the play The Homeland, or Silistra. He died on December 2, 1888, at the age of 47.

The Homeland, or Silistra was staged for the first time on April 1, 1873. The work was translated into Russian and German while the author was still alive, and was later published in many languages. The title The Homeland, or Silistra associates the homeland with Silistra. In other words, the homeland is Silistra. The defense of Silistra is the defense of the homeland.

For adults