Abstract
Ömer Erdem: “The state wants submission, and the poet rebels”
“Turkey has never treated her poets well,” said Ömer Erdem, a Turkish poet known for his evocative verses. Well-read in both Ottoman and European modernist works, Erdem seems like a Turkish reincarnation of TS Eliot. “Since the Westernisation period began in the empire in 1840s, the state never stopped fighting her poets, irrespective of the party in power,” he told Index.
Born in 1967, Erdem moved to Istanbul to study Turkish literature. After graduating, he started publishing poems in numerous Turkish journals and won the Cahit Zarifoğlu poetry prize in 2001. He was among the founders of the poetry journal Kaşgar. He published five poetry collections in the early 2000s and also wrote a weekly column for the prestigious book supplement Radikal Kitap. With his works getting printed by both left-wing and right-wing publishing houses, Erdem seems to have accomplished the difficult task of bridging Turkey’s progressive and conservative cultural traditions.
Erdem describes writing poetry as the most political act in life. “A poet creates a language and a way of saying things, whatever the conditions of his society are like. After all, which fascist or religious regime has managed to completely silence the poet? The great Turkish short story writer Sait Faik famously said that he would go crazy if he did not write.” This is something Erdem also feels strongly, especially living in a country that does not stay true to its commitments to individual and artistic freedoms.
Erdem’s attitude towards a poet’s relationship with the state is simple. “The state wants submission, and the poet rebels against that. It is interesting to see how the Turkish state has not managed to produce a lasting international legacy or institution, while Turkish poetry has managed to preserve its uniqueness and originality.” Erdem accepts that some Turkish poets have chosen to be servants of the state, redefining themselves as state artists and becoming guardians of its ideology in the process. “Who remembers their names, let alone their poems?” he asks.
Erdem sees the creation of a democratic tradition as vital for Turkey. “Democracy is necessary to lay out the legal foundations of brotherhood, to live with people who are different from us,” he says. “For many years, people said that Turks and Kurds were brothers in this country. But brotherhood is not a legal term that makes living together freely and in equal terms a reality. Since the foundation of the republic, a top-down state structure imposed things on people. The state lacked self-confidence and was willing to use violence at the first opportunity.”
Turkish police raided media outlets in December 2014 and detained 23 people nationwide. Here, editor-in-chief Ekrem Dumanli is cheered on by his colleagues as he is escorted from the headquarters of Zaman daily newspaper in Istanbul
Credit: Murad Sezer/ Reuters
Erdem is optimistic about the younger generation of Turkish citizens who are, he says, more eager to voice their demands. He characterises the political climate of the past two years as a chaotic wave of violence. He said: “When I look at what is happening to this country as a poet, I see missed chances and wounds that only get deeper.”
Nilay Özer: “Artists can never stand with the state”
The protests in Gezi Park in 2013 pushed Turkey’s arts scene to the point of no return, said Istanbul-born poet Nilay Özer. “Defending artistic independence, freedom of expression and the right to protest became one and the same thing,” she said. “A world of opportunities opened for poets who were willing to give up on these.” In other words, independent authors and those who sided with the state have gone their separate ways.
Independent authors and those who sided with the state have gone their separate ways
Özer, who belongs to the former group, said it was impossible for an artist to stand together with the state, or any political system. “Artists question every situation, and focus on human stories, rather than accept big generalisations.” She is worried now to see fellow artists being subjected to intimidation and threats. “This undeniably tense new situation is a problem for anyone struggling to have greater freedom of expression.”
When I look at what is happening to this country as a poet, I see missed chances and wounds that only get deeper
Özer, 38, spent her childhood in a working-class neighbourhood in the 1980s, a decade defined by the militarist ideology of General Kenan Evren and the Turkish Armed Forces. “My neighbours were mostly republican, secular people,” she says. “Socialist ideas were prevalent among my student friends. There was also an understanding of Islam, which helped me see what morals meant for people.” She wrote her first poem aged seven and, at 13, won the prestigious Milliyet newspaper’s poetry prize.
Özer soon realised the publishing scene was totally controlled by men. She watched different groups compete for intellectual dominance and decided to keep her distance. “Intellectual groups turn into centres of power in time,” she says. She also saw how the country’s stark realities were quite different from those she grew up in. “Some people forced conservatism on to the country, and there was never-ending political turbulence, while Turkish and Kurdish youths got killed in the background. […] I was living in a political and social era that provided wealthy material for my poetry,” she said. “Poetry for me was not only an intellectual and aesthetic occupation, but also a shelter.”
Özer – who was awarded the prestigious Cemal Süreya prize in 2004 – is fascinated by the wealth of the classic tradition, Arabic and Persian words and expressions, as well as Islamic, Indian and Persian myths. She is fascinated by modernist Turkish poetry, and also the influences of French, German, Russian and English literature. “As a poet I am not a traditionalist. I am someone who wants to feed on Turkish poetry’s historical adventure and its rich poetic reserves.” But she remains irritated that Turkish poets lack the facilities enjoyed by their European and US counterparts, and dreams of seeing more exchange programmes and artistic residencies in Turkey.
“Poetry offers a way to liberate your subconscious, and express the world,” she says. In a country where the political atmosphere gets more suffocating with every passing day, she adds, poetry offers “a sense of vastness, lightness”.
“It offers a sublime experience,” she continued, “and gives us the chance to make the truth visible.”
