Nasreddin or Nasreddin Hodja or Molla Nasreddin Hooja (/næsˈrɛdɪn/[1]) was a Seljuq satirist, born

in Hortu Village in Sivrihisar, Eskişehir Province, present-day Turkey and died in 13th century in
Akşehir, near Konya, a capital of the Seljuk Sultanate of Rum, in today's Turkey.[2] He is considered a
populist philosopher, Sufi and wise man, remembered for his funny stories and anecdotes.[3] He
appears in thousands of stories, sometimes witty, sometimes wise, but often, too, a fool or the butt
of a joke. A Nasreddin story usually has a subtle humour and a pedagogic nature.[4] The International
Nasreddin Hodja festival is celebrated between the 5th and 10th of July in his hometown every
year.[5] He was sent to Anatolia by the Khalif in Baghdad to organize resistance and uprising against
the Mongol invasion. He served as a kadı (an Islamic judge and ombudsman) in Kayseri. This explains
why he addresses judicial problems in the jokes not only religious ones. During the turmoil of the
Mongol invasion he became a political opponent of Persian Rumi. He was addressed in Masnavi by
juha anecdotes for this reason. He became the vazir at the court of Kaykaus II. Having lived in
numerous cities in vast area and being steadfastly against the Mongol invasion as well as having his
witty character, he was embraced by various nations and cultures from Turkey to Arabia, from Persia
to Afghanistan, and from Russia to China, most of which suffered from those invasions. The
Nasreddin stories are known throughout the Middle East and have touched cultures around the
world. Superficially, most of the Nasreddin stories may be told as jokes or humorous anecdotes.

His poems have been widely translated into many of the world's languages and transposed into
various formats. Rumi has been described as the "most

Rumi's works are written mostly in Persian, but occasionally he also used Turkish, Arabic, and
Cappadocian Greek[15][16][17] in his verse.[18][19] His Masnavi (Mathnawi), composed in Konya, is
considered one of the greatest poems of the Persian language.[20][21] His works are widely read
today in their original language across Greater Iran and the Persian-speaking world.[22][23]
Translations of his works are very popular, most notably in Turkey, Azerbaijan, the United States, and
South Asia.[24] His poetry has influenced not only Persian literature, but also Turkish, Ottoman
Turkish, Azerbaijani, as well as the literature of some other Turkic, Iranian, and Indo-Aryan languages
including Chagatai, Urdu and Pashto.

urkish poet, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, director and memoirist. He was acclaimed for the
"lyrical flow of his statements".[5] Described as a "romantic communist"[6] and "romantic
revolutionary",[5] he was repeatedly arrested for his political beliefs and spent much of his adult life
in prison or in exile. His poetry has been translated into more than fifty languages. Despite writing his
first poems in syllabic meter, Nazım Hikmet distinguished himself from the "syllabic poets" in
concept. With the development of his poetic conception, the narrow forms of syllabic verse became
too limiting for his style and he set out to seek new forms for his poems.

He was influenced by the young Soviet poets who advocated Futurism. On his return to Turkey, he
became the charismatic leader of the Turkish avant-garde, producing streams of innovative poems,
plays and film scripts.[6] Breaking the boundaries of syllabic meter, he changed his form and began
writing in free verse, which harmonised with the rich vocal properties of the Turkish language.

He has been compared by Turkish and non-Turkish men of letters to such figures as Federico García
Lorca, Louis Aragon, Vladimir Mayakovsky, Faiz Ahmed Faiz and Pablo Neruda. Although Ran's work
bears a resemblance to these poets and owes them occasional debts of form and stylistic device, his
literary personality is unique in terms of the synthesis he made of iconoclasm and lyricism, of
ideology and poetic diction.[5]:Many of his poems have been set to music by the Turkish composer
Zülfü Livaneli. A part of his work has been translated into Greek by Yiannis Ritsos, and some of these
translations have been arranged by the Greek composers Manos Loizos and Thanos
Mikroutsikos.Because of his political views his works were banned in Turkey from 1938 to 1965.[16]

Cemal Süreya is a notable member of the Second New Generation of Turkish poetry, an abstract and
postmodern movement created as a backlash against the more popular-based Garip movement.
Love, mainly through its erotic character, is a popular theme of Süreya's works. Süreya's poems and
articles were published in magazines such as Yeditepe, Yazko, Pazar Postası, Yeni Ulus, Oluşum,
Türkiye Yazıları, Politika, Aydınlık, and Somut. He is known to have been a primary influence on the
poetry of Sunay Akın.[citation needed] He lost a letter "y" from his pen name – originally Süreyya –
because of a lost bet with Turkish poet Sezai Karakoç.[1]

Can Yücel was the son of a former Minister of National Education, Hasan Ali Yücel who left his mark
on the history of education in Turkey, and a grandchild of an Ottoman sea captain who perished with
the frigate Ertuğrul. He studied Latin and Ancient Greek at Ankara University and Cambridge. He later
worked as a translator at several embassies and in the Turkish language section of the BBC in
London. After his return to Turkey in 1958, he briefly worked as a tourist guide in Bodrum and
Marmaris, and then lived in Istanbul where he worked as a freelance translator and started writing
poetry. Can Yücel was known for using slang and vulgar language in his poems. However, even his
critics agreed that his skill in using words in a simple and understandable way is worthy of praise and
appreciation. The main themes and inspirational sources in his poems are nature, people, events,
concepts, excitements, perceptions, and emotions. His family was of utmost importance to him and
his loved ones are mentioned in many of his poems, such as "To my Little Daughter Su," "To Güzel,"
and "I Loved My Father the Most in Life."Yücel also translated the works of Shakespeare, Lorca and
Brecht into Turkish and his creative rendering of these authors are classics in their own right in
Turkey

Orhan Pamuk; born 7 June 1952) is a Turkish novelist, screenwriter, academic and recipient of the
2006 Nobel Prize in Literature. One of Turkey's most prominent novelists,[1] his work has sold over
thirteen million books in sixty-three languages,[2] making him the country's best-selling writer.[3]

Pamuk is the author of novels including Silent House, The White Castle, The Black Book, The New
Life, My Name Is Red, Snow, The Museum of Innocence, and A Strangeness in My Mind. He is the
Robert Yik-Fong Tam Professor in the Humanities at Columbia University, where he teaches writing
and comparative literature. He was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 2018.[4]Of
partial Circassian descent and born in Istanbul,[5] Pamuk is the first Turkish Nobel laureate. He is also
the recipient of numerous other literary awards. My Name Is Red won the 2002 Prix du Meilleur Livre
Étranger, 2002 Premio Grinzane Cavour and 2003 International Dublin Literary Award.The European
Writers' Parliament came about as a result of a joint proposal by Pamuk and José Saramago.[6] In
2005, the ultra-nationalist lawyer Kemal Kerinçsiz sued Pamuk over his statement regarding the
Armenian Genocide in the Ottoman Empire.[7] His intention, according to Pamuk himself, had been
to highlight issues relating to freedom of speech in the country of his birth. The court initially
declined to hear the case, but in 2011 Pamuk was ordered to pay 6,000 liras in total compensation
for having insulted the plaintiffs' honor.

After graduating, Tanpınar began to teach. Throughout his educational career, he taught at high
schools in Erzurum (1923–24), Konya, Ankara, Istanbul, the Educational Institute of Gazi and the Fine
Arts Academy. At the Fine Arts Academy, besides teaching literature, Tanpınar lectured on branches
of aesthetics in arts, history of art and mythology (1932–39). As an educator, he provoked debate
and a degree of controversy in the 1930s after arguing for the elimination of pre-Tanzimat literature
from national school curricula. In 1939, despite not having obtained a doctorate, Tanpınar was
appointed to the newly founded chair of 19th-Century Turkish Literature, as professor of New
Turkish Literature, at the Istanbul University Literature Faculty by the minister of education, Hasan Âli
Yücel, and was tasked with writing a history of post-Tanzimat Turkish Literature. He published this
study as XIX. Asır Türk Edebiyatı Tarihi in 1949.

Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar (23 June 1901 – 24 January 1962) was a Turkish poet, novelist, literary scholar
and essayist, widely regarded as one of the most important representatives of modernism in Turkish
literature. In addition to his literary and academic career, Tanpınar was also a member of the Turkish
Parliament between 1944 and 1946.The 1940s marked a period of great productivity for Tanpınar.
Beş Şehir (Five Cities, 1946), a collection of essays on the cities of Erzurum, Konya, Istanbul, Bursa
and Ankara, followed the publication of his first novel, Mahur Beste in 1944. Huzur (translated to
English as A Mind at Peace) appeared in 1949 and Sahnenin Dışındakiler (Those Who Stand Outside
the Stage) in 1950. Together, these three novels constitute a trilogy. In 1953, he made an extensive
journey to Europe over the course of six months, traveling to many countries including France,
Belgium, Holland, England, Spain and Italy.In 1954, Tanpınar published Saatleri Ayarlama Enstitüsü,
translated as The Time Regulation Institute. The book explores, in an often absurd and sardonic style
making heavy use of symbolic imagery, such topics as Turkey's troubled transition to a modern
society and the departure from old values (and sometimes from reason) that it entails. Şiirler
(Poems), a selection of 37 poems of the 74 Tanpınar published in his lifetime, appeared in print in
1961, the year before his death.

Aziz Nesin (pronounced [ˈaziz ˈne.sin ]; born Mehmet Nusret,¶ 20 December 1915 – 6 July 1995) was
a Turkish writer, humorist and the author of more than 100 books. Born in a time when Turks did not
have official surnames, he had to adopt one after the Surname Law of 1934 was passed. Although his
family carried the epithet "Topalosmanoğlu", after an ancestor named "Topal Osman", he chose the
surname "Nesin". In Turkish, Nesin? means, What are you?.[1]
Yaşar Kemal (born Kemal Sadık Gökçeli;[1] 6 October 1923 – 28 February 2015) was a Turkish writer
and human rights activist of Kurdish origin. He was one of Turkey's leading writers.[2][3] He received
38 awards during his lifetime and had been a candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature on the
strength of Memed, My Hawk.[4][5]

An outspoken intellectual, he often did not hesitate to speak about sensitive issues, especially those
concerning the oppression of the Kurdish people.[6] He was tried in 1995 under anti-terror laws for
an article he wrote for German magazine Der Spiegel accusing the Turkish army of destroying Kurdish
villages. He was released but later received a suspended 20-month jail sentence for an article he
wrote criticising the Turkish racism against the minorities in Turkey, especially against the Kurds.
Kemal published his first book Ağıtlar ("Ballads") in 1943, which was a compilation of folkloric
themes. This book brought to light many long forgotten rhymes and ballads. He had begun to collect
these ballads at the age of 16.[1] His first stories Bebek ("The Baby"), Dükkancı ("The Shopkeeper")
and Memet ile Memet ("Memet and Memet") were published in 1950. He penned his first tale Pis
Hikaye ("The Dirty Story") in 1944, while he was serving in the military, in Kayseri. Then he published
his book of short stories Sarı Sıcak ("Yellow Heat") in 1952. The initial point of his works was the toil
of the people of the Çukurova plains and he based the themes of his writings on the lives and
sufferings of these people. Kemal used the legends and stories of Anatolia extensively as the basis for
his works.[1] He received international acclaim with the publication of Memed, My Hawk (Turkish:
İnce Memed) in 1955. In İnce Memed, Kemal criticizes the fabric of the society through a legendary
hero, a protagonist, who flees to the mountains as a result of the oppression of the Aghas. One of the
most famous writers in Turkey, Kemal was noted for his command of the language and lyrical
description of bucolic Turkish life. He was awarded 19 literary prizes during his lifetime and
nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1973.His 1955 novel Teneke was adapted into a
theatrical play, which was staged for almost one year in Gothenburg, Sweden, in the country where
he lived for about two years in the late 1970s.[33] Italian composer Fabio Vacchi adapted the same
novel with the original title into an opera of three acts, which premiered at the Teatro alla Scala in
Milano, Italy in 2007.Kemal was a major contributor to Turkish literature in the early years after the
language's recreation as a literary language following Atatürk's Reforms of the 1930s.

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Zülfü Livaneli

Livaneli.jpg
Born Ömer Zülfü Livanelioğlu

June 20, 1946 (age 72)

Nationality Turkish

Occupation Author, poet, composer, politician, human rights activist

Notable work

'Bliss, My Brother's Story, Serenade for Nadia

Spouse(s) Ülker Livaneli

Children Aylin Livaneli

Awards Barnes & Noble 'Discovery of a Great New Author Award', 2006 (Bliss) - Balkan Literary
Award for 'Best Novel', 1997 (The Eunuch of Constantinople) - Yunus Nadi Literary Award for 'Best
Novel', 2001 (Memory of Snow)] - Orhan Kemal Literary Award for 'Best Novel', 2009 (Last Island)

Website Livaneli's Official Website

Ömer Zülfü Livanelioğlu (born June 20, 1946), better known as Zülfü Livaneli, is a Turkish musician,
author, poet, and politician.

Livaneli is known for his novels that interweave diverse social and historical backgrounds, figures,
and incidents, such as in Bliss which won the Barnes & Noble's Discovery of Great New Writers Award
in 2006, and in his Serenade for Nadia, Leyla's House, and My Brother's Story, which were all
translated into 37 languages and won numerous Turkish and International literary awards, and were
highly praised by prominent literary critics around the world.[citation needed] His novels have been
turned into theatrical films, stage plays, and operas.

Livaneli was imprisoned several times during the 1971 Turkish coup d'état because of his political
views and had to leave Turkey in 1972 and went on exile. He lived in Stockholm, Paris, Athens, and
New York where he met and collaborated with artists and intellectuals such as Elia Kazan, Arthur
Miller, James Baldwin, and Peter Ustinov among others. Livaneli returned to Turkey in 1984.

His works and cultural and political activities and contributions to world peace were recognized by
UNESCO in 1995 when he was appointed Goodwill Ambassador to UNESCO—a post he still holds
today. He served a term in the Turkish Parliament as well as in the Council of Europe.

Livaneli is a writer as he is as a poet and a songwriter, cultural and political activist. Although he first
became known for his contemporary music, Livaneli turned his focus to writing, in the last decades,
when he realized that literature was closer to his heart. His first collection of short stories, A Child in
Purgatory, published in 1978 was turned into a movie by Swedish and German TV. He is also a
prominent social-democrat politician and was a member of the Turkish parliament for one term.
Livaneli's novels have been turned into theatrical movies, stage plays, and operas.

Livaneli is known for his contemporary music. His 1997 Ankara concert was attended by no less than
500 thousand people.[citation needed] His collaborations with Mikis Theodorakis of Greece have
been noted as a gesture of bringing together the two countries.[citation needed] Livaneli has been a
UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador since 1996.Livaneli has composed some three hundred songs, a
rhapsody recorded by London Symphony Orchestra–, and a ballet. His compositions have reached
cult status nationwide and have been performed by artists such as Joan Baez, Maria Farantouri,
María del Mar Bonet, Udo Lindenberg, Haris Alexiou, Jocelyn B. Smith, and Kate Westbrook. He has
also written five plays and thirty film soundtracks. Among these soundtracks are the soundtrack for
"Yol" (The Path), directed by Yilmaz Güney and winner of the Golden Palm in Cannes Film Festival,
"The Herd", directed by Yılmaz Güney and Zeki Öktem, and "Shirin's Wedding" by German director
Helma Sanders-Brahms. His recordings have been published in the USA, Sweden, Germany, Holland
and France, and he has given dozens of concerts throughout the world.[citation needed] He has
produced albums and performed with Mikis Theodorakis and Maria Farantouri, and he has also
collaborated with Manos Hatzidakis, Giora Feidman, Inti-Illimani and Ángel Parra. In 2010, he sang
'Mothers of The Disappeared' with Bono at U2's concert in Istanbul, Turkey, which was U2's first-ever
concert in Istanbul. Livaneli has been distinguished with the awards Best Album of the Year (Greece),
the Edison Award (Holland), and Best Album of the Year (Music Critics Guild of Germany), and the
"Premio Luigi Tenco" Best Songwriter Award, San Remo, Italy, in 1999, among others.