Mehmet Yaşın (born 1958) is a

Turkish Cypriot Turkish Cypriots or Cypriot Turks ( or ; ) are so called ethnic Turks originating from Cyprus. Turkish Cypriots are mainly Sunni Muslims. Following the Ottoman conquest of the island in 1571, about 30,000 Turkish settlers were given land onc ...

poet and author.

Biography

Mehmet Yaşın was born in the Yenişehir neighborhood of

Nicosia Nicosia, also known as Lefkosia and Lefkoşa, is the capital and largest city of Cyprus. It is the southeasternmost of all EU member states' capital cities. Nicosia has been continuously inhabited for over 5,500 years and has been the capi ...

to Turkish-Cypriot parents. His father is the accomplished poet and author Özker Yaşın, and his sister the well-known poet Neşe Yaşın. He left Cyprus at the age of 17, and went to study in Turkey,Kıbrıs'ta yazarlık zor
(Radikal) where he studied at the

Ankara University Ankara University () is a public university, public research university in Ankara, the capital of Turkey. It was the first higher education institution founded in Turkey after the History of the Republic of Turkey, formation of the Turkish republ ...

and

Istanbul University Istanbul University, also known as University of Istanbul (), is a Public university, public research university located in Istanbul, Turkey. Founded by Mehmed II on May 30, 1453, a day after Fall of Constantinople, the conquest of Constantinop ...

. He received postgraduate education at the

University of Birmingham The University of Birmingham (informally Birmingham University) is a Public university, public research university in Birmingham, England. It received its royal charter in 1900 as a successor to Queen's College, Birmingham (founded in 1825 as ...

and University of Middlesex,Mehmet Yashin
(Cypnet.co.uk) and was also educated in France and the United States. He speaks Turkish, English and Greek. His first poem was published in 1979 at the Turkish journal ''Sanat Emeği'' ("Art Work"), and his poems received attention in the journals ''Yazko Edebiyat'', ''Adam Sanat'' and ''Defter'' in the 1980s. His first book of poetry, ''Sevgilim Ölü Asker'' ("My Darling, Dead Soldier") received critical acclaim and was awarded the Academy Poetry Award and the A. Kadir Award, but it was banned due to its "dangerous content".Khora Kitap Cafe'de Mehmet Yaşın'la edebiyat sohbeti
(Kıbrıs Postası) He published his first novel, ''Your Kinsman Pisces'', in 1994. His work often features the theme of loss, as he was heavily influenced by the loss of the cosmopolitan quality of his neighborhood, Yenişehir, and the destruction of their house in the 1974 conflict. In 2002, he published poems in the

Karamanli Turkish Karamanli Turkish (; ) is an extinct dialect of the Turkish language spoken by the Karamanlides. Although the official Ottoman Turkish was written in the Arabic script, the Karamanlides used the Greek alphabet to write their form of Turkish. K ...

language, at a period when he withdrew from publicity. He published the book ''An Anthology of Cypriot Poetry'', where he translated Cypriot poems from the Phoenician and Lusignan eras for the first time, with the aid of historians and archaeologists. The book received the Memet Fuat Criticism/Inquisition Award. At the time, he delivered lessons of Turkish Cypriot literature, comparative literature and theory of translation in northern and southern Cyprus.Memet Fuat'a Saygı
(Milliyet) His works have been translated to more than 20 languages and have been set to music in Cyprus, Turkey, the UK and the Netherlands.

Bibliography

*''My Love The Dead Soldier'', 1984 *''Ladder of Light'', 1986 *''Pathos'', 1990 *''The Armchair of the Promise'', 1993 *''Your Kinsman Pisces'', 1994 *''Anthology of Turkish-Cypriot Poetry: 18th to 20th centuries'', 1994 *''Poeturka'', 1995 *''To Repair a Daydream'', 1998 *''Anthology of Early Cypriot Poetry: 9th century BC to 18th century AD'', 1999 *''Step-Mothertongue – From Nationalism to Multiculturalism: Literatures of Cyprus, Greece and Turkey'', 2000 *''Don't Go Back To Kyrenia'', 2001 *''His Name is on the List of the Missing'', 2002 *''The Yellow Bird'', 2007 *''Heart-stopped in Time'', 2009 *''The Child that Fled His Home'', 2013 *''Yellow Amber'', 2014

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Yasin, Mehmet 1958 births Turkish Cypriot writers Turkish Cypriot poets Living people People from North Nicosia Ankara University alumni Istanbul University alumni Turkish Cypriot expatriates in Turkey Turkish Cypriot expatriates in the United Kingdom Alumni of the University of Birmingham