Known mostly as a novelist, Hüseyin Kıran entered literature with a book of poems, Madde Kara (Black Matter), which came out in 2004. He was born in Amasya in 1965. The novel Resul, published two years later, brought his name to a wide readership. Ten years after the first book came a second collection of poems, Küstah (Insolent); poetry did not remain a beginning he left behind on his way to the novel. What follows rests on the entry in the Türk Edebiyatı İsimler Sözlüğü (Dictionary of Names in Turkish Literature, TEİS), on Semih Gümüş's review of Resul and on the publication details of his books, and does not stray beyond his published literary life.

His Life

He spent his school years in Amasya, up to the end of high school. He left university unfinished for political reasons and, for the same reasons, spent ten years in prison. He began to write after those years, as he was approaching forty: Madde Kara came out from Metis Yayınları in 2004. His poems were published in the reviews Defter, İzlek and E. He was the first recipient of the Literature Grant awarded jointly by the Istanbul Copyright Office (İstanbul Telif Ofisi) and the Gümüşlük Academy; the year of the grant is not given in TEİS, and an online encyclopedia record shows it as 2017.

Amasya is where Kıran was born and where he spent his school years until he finished high school. The sources examined do not say whether the city enters his novels or poems as a setting, so this account goes no further than the years of his youth.

His Poetry

Copyright note: Since Hüseyin Kıran is living, his works are protected by copyright, and his poems cannot be published on separate pages. Below is only a short quotation of three lines, as given in the TEİS entry.

In Kıran's view poetry is a harder field than the novel. Aliye Uslu Üstten, who wrote the entry, reports that he regards poetry as a "special and difficult" pursuit, while he sees writing novels as an ease he likens to water finding its course. From his first book, Madde Kara, the entry quotes these lines:

hayatı hıncın mükemmel terazisiyle tarttım
sarı sanrılarla yıkadım yüzümü
kendime kelimelerden binalar yaptım

(I weighed life on the perfect scales of rancour / I washed my face with yellow delusions / I built myself buildings out of words.) There is a reckoning in these lines: life is weighed by the measure of rancour like a load set on the pan of a balance, the face is washed in yellow delusions, and shelter is built out of words. Üstten writes that this questioning and the rancour gathered within take another form in Küstah, published by İkaros Yayınları in 2014, turning into a style that identifies protest and revolt with boundlessness. No source quoting from Küstah has been seen.

His Novels

Resul (2006) is the author's best-known book. In his review, published in Milliyet Sanat in June 2006, Semih Gümüş reads the novel as a text with a singular language, written from inside the consciousness of a man whose personality has been shattered by torture. The apparatus of violence that takes hold of the protagonist is called "the Circle" (Daire) in the novel, and the period is never named outright. Gümüş asks whether the novel can be read as a response to 12 September, then carries his own reading elsewhere: he says he read Resul not as a "novel of an era" but as a "novel of a moment", one that tells of the particular sufferings of an individual. His verdict is brief: "Resul is the novel of defeat."

Three novels followed. According to TEİS, Gecedegiden (Ayrıntı, 2011) deals with the contradiction between the real world and consciousness, and with how meaning finds a place in the false world we build for ourselves; the title is spelled differently in the sources: "Gecede Giden" in the entry's list of works, "Gecegiden" in its text, and "Gecedegiden" in the other records. Benim Adım Meleklerin Hizasına Yazılıdır (My Name Is Written Alongside the Angels, Ayrıntı, 2013) tells of the consciousness of Ruhi Bey, at odds with dogma and with society, in a language full of allusions to sacred texts; the mental hospital of the novel has been read as a metaphor for the world of those who are shut out or shut away. The sources part ways, too, over the publication details of his last novel, Dağ Yolunda Karanlık Birikiyor (Darkness Gathers on the Mountain Road): TEİS gives Yapı Kredi Yayınları and 2019, while another record shows Sel Yayıncılık and 2016. In 2018 Yapı Kredi published his book of essays, Yaşamak - Bir Çaba (Living: An Effort).

The author says he writes his novels without plotting them in advance, "as the pen comes", in his own words. He objects to critics finding anti-heroes in his books; he defines the purpose of his writing as understanding the world and making the reader aware that the world is a hard place to live in. Üstten holds that the influence of the poet can be seen in the allegorical language of his novels.

Works

  • Madde Kara, poems, Istanbul: Metis, 2004.
  • Resul, novel, Istanbul: Metis, 2006.
  • Gecedegiden, novel, Istanbul: Ayrıntı, 2011.
  • Benim Adım Meleklerin Hizasına Yazılıdır, novel, Istanbul: Ayrıntı, 2013.
  • Küstah, poems, Istanbul: İkaros, 2014.
  • Yaşamak - Bir Çaba, essays, Istanbul: Yapı Kredi, 2018.
  • Dağ Yolunda Karanlık Birikiyor, novel (TEİS: Yapı Kredi, 2019; other record: Sel, 2016).

Chronology

1965: Born in Amasya.

2004: His first book, the poetry collection Madde Kara, is published.

2006: Resul appears; Semih Gümüş's review is published in Milliyet Sanat in June.

2011: Gecedegiden is published.

2013: Benim Adım Meleklerin Hizasına Yazılıdır appears.

2014: His second book of poems, Küstah, is published.

2018: Yaşamak - Bir Çaba appears.

Bibliography

Books

  • Aliye Uslu Üstten, "Hüseyin Kıran", Türk Edebiyatı İsimler Sözlüğü, 15.09.2019 (updated 02.11.2020). https://teis.yesevi.edu.tr/madde-detay/huseyin-kiran
  • Murat Yalçın (ed.), "Kıran, Hüseyin", Tanzimat'tan Bugüne Edebiyatçılar Ansiklopedisi, vol. II, Istanbul: Yapı Kredi Yayınları, 2010, p. 627 (as cited in TEİS).

Other sources

Online sources