Preface
Many works of research on Turkish literature and many anthologies of Turkish poets have been published in many languages until the year 2005; however, with the shortage of information on Turkish writers, the abundance of the deficiencies and the necessity for an update of this information, we have been urged to prepare a brand new, comprehensive and objective introduction of the literary and scientific production in Turkey. This work aims to fill in such a gap and to meet the necessity for such an introduction.
The encyclopedia introduces 2023 poets and writers of the literary, philosophical and scientific life in Turkey. The names mentioned herein have been selected delicately from my voluminous work titled Türkiye Edebiyat, Kültür ve Bilim Adamları Ansiklopedisi (Encyclopedia of Turkish Authors People of Literature, Culture and Science) that has been published in 10 volumes in Turkish and concurrently has the qualification of an anthology containing 10,000 names. Aforementioned 2023 names are the owners of the most important works in Turkish language since 11th century and bear different political views and some of them live abroad, which reveals the cultural wealth of Turkey.
The selection of the names included in the encyclopedia has been made objectively, without any discrimination of political views and beliefs as the major criterion on the selection has been that they be the leading people in the literary, philosophical and scientific life in Turkey. Besides, this work is the only comprehensive source in and out of Turkey, as not only the writers of literature but also of other fields are introduced.
Turkish literature has had many representatives with thousands of authentic works and has an distinguished place in the world literature. Furthermore, the Turkish philosophers and scientists have written works on the most important issues of our age. We would be greatly honored, should our work contribute to the studies on these names and to pave the way to make more benefits from their works.
The encyclopedia includes a dictionary at the end for the readers who do not know Turkish language where we have given brief explanations of the terms signed with (*) in the biographies. Furthermore, an "Index" has been supplemented for purposes of a detailed search.
I extend my thankfulness to my beloved Gülay Işık who has tided me over during this hard work; to my companion redactor Hayriye Ünal; to the other colleagues Canan Sevinç, Berman Erdoğmuş, Selçuk Işık, Levent Kozan; to the coordinator of translation Sebahat Özdemir, to the redactor Richard Barbery; to the other translators Asude Aydın, Can Sarduç, Cangül Canpolat, Sebla Küçük and Yeşim Eşberk; to my author friends, Mehmet Aycı, Dr. Necmettin Turinay, Ömer Lekesiz, Ömer Erdem, Ali Çolak, Güngör Gençay, M. Mahzun Doğan, Doğan Hızlan and Zeki Büyüktanır, who have assisted me in finding sources of information; and to the reverend bureaucrats, who assisted me in providing support, Minister of State Prof. Dr. Beşir Atalay, Minister of Culture and Tourism Atilla Koç, Undersecretary of Ministry of Culture Prof. Dr. Mustafa İsen, Minister of Internal Affairs Abdulkadir Aksu, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of State Dr. Abdullatif Şener, ex-Minister of Culture and poet Prof. Dr. Talat Sait Halman, ex-Minister of Culture Namık Kemal Zeybek.
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