Millennium of Turkish Literature : a concise History

Tutunamayanlar
(Th
e 
Maladjusted, 1971–72); Yusuf Atılgan, a maverick writer about psycho-
logical misfi ts; İhsan Oktay Anar, who brought stimulating dimensions 
to historical episodes; Ayşe Kulin, who is the author of several exciting 
best-sellers, some based on the life experiences of her family members; 
Tahsin Yücel, one of the most accomplished and versatile novelists ever to 
write in the Turkish language; Feyyaz Kayacan, who has craft ed engross-
ing nightmarish stories of World War II; Abbas Sayar, who wrote a 
succès 
d’estime
about an old horse; Osman Necmi Gürmen, who has produced 
notable novels about modern Turkish society and Ottoman events; Gülten 
Dayıoğlu and Mustafa Ruhi Şirin, two of the many accomplished writers 
of children’s fi ction; Öner Yağcı, who has eff ectively depicted the aft er-
math of a military coup; Feride Çiçekoğlu, who is well known for fanciful 
fi ction; and Demir Özlü and Burhan Günel, who enjoy a loyal following 
for their craft smanlike narratives. Nedim Gürsel’s novels about Ottoman 
history and modern Turkey win hosannas not only in his homeland, but 
also in Europe and elsewhere.
Among contemporary masters of fi ction are such highly successful 
authors as Ayla Kutlu, İnci Aral, Erendiz Atasü, Pınar Kür, Alev Alatlı. 
Th
e fi eld of fi ction is oft en dominated by powerful novels that come from 
Murathan Mungan, Selim İleri, Mehmet Eroğlu, and Ahmet Altan.
Turkish-style magical realism is quite strong thanks to the remark-
able novels of Latife Tekin, Nazlı Eray, Buket Uzuner, and Aslı Erdoğan, 
whose works have been translated into several major languages, especially 
English.

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Republic and Renascence
123
Satirical fi ction is still dominated by Aziz Nesin (1916–95), Turkey’s 
best satirist ever. In scores of books, Nesin strongly indicts the oppression 
and brutalization of the common man. His hero is the man in the street 
beleaguered by the inimical forces of modern life. He lambastes bureau-
cracy and exposes economic inequities in stories that eff ectively combine 
local color and universal verities.
Seldom in the course of Turkish literature has there been a gentler and 
more eff ective satirist of hypocrisy, sham, and a whole range of foibles than 
Haldun Taner (1915–86), who always wrote with empathy and compassion 
and out of a powerful faith in the perfectibility of the human being. Inter-
estingly, Nesin, Turkey’s supreme satirist, who was born a year later than 
Taner, held very little optimism that the human personality will improve 
but believed that a new ideological structuring might redeem society.
In sharp contrast to realist fi ction, a group of authors, some well versed 
in English and French, produced stream-of-consciousness fi ction heavily 
infl uenced by Joyce and Faulkner as well as by the French 
nouveau roman.
Th
eir works depict psychological crises in lyrical and sometimes turgid 
styles. Some of them off er tragicomic scenes of modern life by means of 
a decomposed language. Th
e principal themes of modern fi ction all over 
the world also characterize the Turkish 
nouvelle vague:
dehumanization, 
moral disintegration, absurdity, lack of heroism, ennui, futility, hypocrisy. 
Th
e protagonists are oft en abstractions of psychic turmoil, and phenom-
ena are presented in terms of transmogrifi cation. Th
e leading authors of 
this mode of fi ction—Feyyaz Kayacan (1919–93), Bilge Karasu (1930–95), 
Orhan Duru (1933–2009)—expanded the scope of psychic experiences in 
Turkish literature and, while forcing the language to the breaking point, 
enriched expressive resources and rhythmic formulations.
Oktay Akbal (b. 1923) shares with this group a Kafk aesque sense of 
reality and utter despair although he departs from them in his use of a 
simple staccato—almost pointillistic—style. But both the