As İlkyaz, we work to introduce three young writers every month. We translate these works, which are be made up of a short stories or poems, into English and endeavour to introduce them to readers outside of Turkey.
March’s works are now live and can be found below.
This, we hope, will create new audiences for our writers in the world arena and introduce them to a global network of the world’s literary figures.
In December, we initiated this effort with Norwegian PEN’s lead. After PEN Germany, PEN Belgium/Flanders continued the very same role for the month of February. For March, PEN French Centre is taking over the role of promoting our young writers abroad. We heartedly thank PEN French Centre members, administrators and our translators Halil Gediz (also advisory board member) and Melis Yakut Aksoy for their diligent collaboration in making the voices of our young writers heard in French.
To access the PEN French Centre’s website where İlkyaz is kindly promoted and March’s works are displayed in French click here.
We also issued a call to artists and creatives for our new initiative “Literature +”
If you haven’t yet had a chance to read, you can browse our February issue here.
March’s works are live and can be found below.
Don’t forget to check out our writers under the age of 15, in “15-“, the story of Ankara based band Sinağrit Baba in “Human Portraits”, and renown author and PEN International board member Margie Orford’s reading suggestions with reasons why to young writers.
You can also keep up with new shares on our blog, our music playlist and new entries on our main page.
“This is the story of semi-deaf Sadık who speaks only of the gods in his poems and who learned his house was confiscated yet he could not be seized
“I wouldn’t know what’s to be
What I know most certainly to be
I know most that will be”
The tiny, arid red spots on Sadık’s body
His body barely the size of his capacity
Now his chest won’t fill no more than his breath
He heard about the human from a teacher
No work place runs on wedding day.”
About the Author: 18 years old. Biography not preferred
İsmail Palıt – Düşünüş / To Think / Réflexion
“This hand is full of money, 2.5 Turkish Liras.
2.5 bread, 2.5 days inside her palm.
Must have been inadequate, hand still rests in mid-air.
The womens eyes fixed on the floor.
Can she see?
It’s like she sees but is she looking?
It seems she doesnt.
The women waits, as if she did everything unconsciously.
She waits, as if consciousness never existed.
She waits, -Tick Tock Tick Tock-
The women’s hand full of 3 Liras, 3 breads, 3 days.
And 5 Liras.
And 10.”
About the Author:
I was born in the winter of 1995 in Kahramanmaraş, Turkey. About three months after my birth, I lived in Bursa for 10 years. If we keep in mind that I don’t remember my first five years, Bursa became the most important city of my life, probably because in the remainder of my five years there I met people who I cannot forget and had a beautiful childhood. I moved to Ankara with a 20 scar of twenty stiches in my palm in 2005, as if it has been carved as memorabilia for Bursa. I studied middle and high school in Ankara, Eryaman, the town I live. I noted clearly that the characteristics of Eryaman, that it’s far from most anything, and that rolls out a long road before any meeting, has traces of my own personality. In 2004, I moved to Bilkent Universities Electrical and Electronic Engineering department in 2014, which I expect to graduate from in 2019. And would you believe it, I just had a root canal operation.
S.Emre Özen -Yeni Bir Mevsim Doğar / A New Season is Born / Une Nouvelle Saison est Né
“He pulled up his blanket, buried his head under the mountains. The horns got louder the faster he ran and his eyelashes failed to resist his eyes. Eventually they busted open, the seas pulled back, leaving the pillow that he thought was a mountain he buried his head under on the ground. Rubbed his eyes with ash stained fingers. He pulled against the iron rails of the bed to stand up, after slipping in his slippers without a look with great mastery; he went over to the hob and put out the flames under boiling water. At last, the horns driving him mad had ceased, he had a gulp from a glass of water left over from yesterday.”
About the author: Biography not preferred
