MarioninTurkey´s thread is for suggestions of who she should include in her book, here I want people to post short biographies - one biography per post!

Yusuf Atılgan (27 June 1921, Manisa - 9 October 1989, İstanbul) was a Turkish novelist and dramatist, who is best known for his novels Aylak Adam (The Loiterer) and Anayurt Oteli (Motherland Hotel).

Atılgan finished middle school in Manisa, then high school in Balıkesir. He graduated in Turkish language and literature from İstanbul University. He finished his thesis titled Tokatlı Kani: Sanat, şahsiyet ve psikoloji under the eye of Nihat Tarlan. Atılgan then began teaching literature at Maltepe Askeri Lisesi in Akşehir. In 1946, he settled down at a village named Hacırahmanlı near Manisa where he took up writing. His novel Aylak Adam was published in 1959 which dealt with psychological themes such as loneliness and obsession. This was followed in 1973 by Anayurt Oteli. In 1976, he began working in İstanbul as an editor and translator. With his wife Serpil he had a son in 1979 named Mehmet.

Atılgan died of a heart attack in 1989 while in the middle of writing a novel titled Canistan (from wikipedia)

Oğuz Atay (1934-1977) was a pioneer of the modern novel in Turkey. His first novel, Tutunamayanlar (The Good for Nothing), appeared 1971-72. Never reprinted in his lifetime and controversial among critics, it has become a best-seller since a new edition came out in 1984. It has been described as “probably the most eminent novel of twentieth-century Turkish literature”: this reference is due to a UNESCO survey, which goes on: “it poses an earnest challenge to even the most skilled translator with its kaleidoscope of colloquialisms and sheer size.” No translation has yet been published in any language. However, Hanneke van der Heijden has announced a Dutch translation by herself and Margreet Dorleijn, scheduled to appear in 2010

He was born October 12, 1934 in İnebolu, a small town (population less than 10,00 in the centre of the Black Sea coast, 590 km from İstanbul. His father was a judge and his mother a schoolteacher, thus both representative of the modernization of Turkey brought about by Atatürk. Although he lived most of his life in big cities this provincial background was important to his work. He was at high school in Ankara until 1951, and after military service enrolled at Istanbul Technical University, where he graduated as a civil engineer in 1957. With a friend he started an enterprise as a building contractor. This failed, leaving him (as such experiences have for other novelists) valuable material for his writing. In 1960 he joined the staff of the İstanbul Academy of Engineering and Architecture, where he worked until his final illness; he was promoted to associate professorship in 1970, for which he presented as his qualification a textbook on surveying, Topoğrafya. His first creative work, Tutunamayanlar, was awarded the prize of Turkish Radio Television Institution, TRT in 1970, before it had been published. He went on to write another novel and a volume of short stories among other works.

He died in İstanbul, December 13, 1977, of a brain tumour. He spent much of his last year in London, where he had gone for treatment. He married twice, and left a daughter by his first marriage.

(From wikipedia)

 Great! Let´s see how long it takes for this thread to degenerate into a political argument too ...

Fatma Aliye Topuz - (1862-1936) Turkish novelist, columnist, essayist, humanitarian, women´s rights activist. Fatma Aliye is credited as the first female novelist in Turkish literature and Islamic geography. Her pen name was "Bir Hanım" (A Lady) and "Mutercime -i Meram" (Translator of Meram). Fatma was born to a leading Ottoman civil servant and historian Ahmet Cevdet Pasha, who was a wali (province governor) in Egypt and Greece. Because of her father´s position, Fatma spent some time in Aleppo, Janina and Damascus. She was educated at home, since it was not common to send girls to school (even though there was no legal restriction to send girls to school). Due to her intellectual curiosity, she learned Arabic and French.

At the age of 17, her father arranged her marriage to a captain-major Mehmet Faik Bey. She gave birth to 4 daughters, the first one when she was only 18 years old. During the first years of her marriage, her husband, who was intellectually less endowed, did not allow her to read novels in foreign languages.

With her husband´s permission, 10 years after her marriage she debuted with the translation of the novel Volonte from French to Turkish, under the pen name "Bir Hanım". A renowned writer Ahmet Mithat Efendi was so impressed with her that he declared her his honorary daughter. Five years later, she co-authored with him a novel Hayal ve Hakikat (Dream and Truth); the work was signes as "Bir Kadın ve Ahmet Mithat".

Two years earlier, Fatma published her first novel Muhazarat (Useful Information), under her real name, in which she tried to disprove the belief that a woman cannot forget her first love. It was the first novel in the entire Ottoman Empire written by a woman.

In 1899, she published Udi (The Lute Player) in which she portrayed the life story of Bedia, a female oud player whom Fatma met in Aleppo, and her unhappy marriage.

In her other novels, she talked about marriage, the importance of courtship as opposed to arranged marriage, and depicted independent and self reliant heroines who work and earn their own money. Her prominence grew when Ahmet Mithat published a book The Birth of An Ottoman Female Writer.

Fatma Aliye was engaged in charity and was a columnist for women´s magazine Ladies´ Own Gazette.

She is depicted on the reverse of the 50 Turkish lira banknote issued in 2009.

wowwwwgreat effort and important informations

thanks catwoman.