İsmet Özel’s Perspective on Turkish Society and Political Events in his Poetry during 1965-1975 Period

Abstract

İsmet Özel (b.1944) is one of the most important figures of Turkish poetry after 1960, and his name is important in Turkish literature. His writing influenced Turkish poetry and the Turkish world of thought. In Özel’s first poems, there are traces of the İkinci Yeni Movement. In these poems, he continues the raisond’être of his inner world. In the mid-1960s, his writing began to show the influence of a socialist world view. Özel reflects these effects and the appearances of the current political struggles and conflicts in Turkish society during the period from1965-1975. These poems are found in his books Evet, İsyan (1969) and Cinayetler Kitabı (1975). He approaches social and political events with a socialist eye. He makes room in his poems to think about worker and student revolts during this period. Özel interprets Turkey’s and the world’s current issues through his poems. He believes he is acting with a sense of responsibility. During this period, his writing takes a closer stance toward the “socialist realist” understanding of art. On the other hand, he also wants to represent his individual world. Thus, he does not want to repeat some of the mistakes other socialist realist poets made. After 1975, he made radical changes in his political views and came up with his works, which were written from an Islamic world view. This study examines and traces the political events of the 1965-1975 period in İsmet Özel’s poetry and his perspective on society as an important element of his approach toward these political events.