Sabahattin Ali was a Turkish

Turkish people

Turkish people, also known as the "Turks" , are an ethnic group primarily living in Turkey and in the former lands of the Ottoman Empire where Turkish minorities had been established in Bulgaria, Cyprus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Greece, Kosovo, Macedonia, and Romania...

 novelist, short-story writer, poet, and journalist.

Early life

He was born in 1907 in Eğridere

Ardino

Ardino is a town in Southern Bulgaria, in the Rhodope Mountains. It is located in Kurdzhali oblast and is close to the town of Madan.It is famous for its textile industry. It has a machine-building factory and a tobacco manufacturing industry. Tourist attractions include the Eagle rocks and the...

 (now Ardino in southern Bulgaria) township in Gümülcine

Komotini

Komotini is a city in Thrace, northeastern Greece. It is the capital of the region of East Macedonia and Thrace and of the Rhodope regional unit. It is also the administrative center of the Rhodope-Evros super-prefecture. The city is home to the Democritus University of Thrace, founded in 1973...

 (now Komotini in northern Greece) sanjak , in the Ottoman Empire

Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...

. He lived in Istanbul

Istanbul

Istanbul , historically known as Byzantium and Constantinople , is the largest city of Turkey. Istanbul metropolitan province had 13.26 million people living in it as of December, 2010, which is 18% of Turkey's population and the 3rd largest metropolitan area in Europe after London and...

, Çanakkale

Çanakkale

Çanakkale is a town and seaport in Turkey, in Çanakkale Province, on the southern coast of the Dardanelles at their narrowest point. The population of the town is 106,116 . The mayor is Ülgür Gökhan ....

 and Edremit

Edremit

Edremit may refer to:* Edremit , Balıkesir, Turkey* Edremit , Van, Turkey* Edremit, Turkish name for Trimithi, Northern Cyprus...

 before he entered the school of education in Balıkesir

Balikesir

Balıkesir is the capital city of Balıkesir Province. Balıkesir is in the Marmara region of Turkey and has a population of 265,747 inhabitants. Old name is Karesi or Karasi.- History :...

. Then he was transferred to the school of education in Istanbul, where he graduated in 1926. After being a teacher for one year in Yozgat

Yozgat

Yozgat is a city and the capital district of Yozgat province in the Central Anatolia region of Turkey. According to 2009 census, population of the district is 113,614 of which 73,835 live in the city of Yozgat.-History:...

, he earned a fellowship from the ministry of education and studied in Germany from 1928 to 1930. When he returned to Turkey

Turkey

Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

, he taught German in Aydın

Aydin

Aydın is a city in and the seat of Aydın Province in Turkey's Aegean Region. The city is located at the heart of the lower valley of Büyük Menderes River at a commanding position for the region extending from the uplands of the valley down to the seacoast...

 and Konya

Konya

Konya is a city in the Central Anatolia Region of Turkey. The metropolitan area in the entire Konya Province had a population of 1,036,027 as of 2010, making the city seventh most populous in Turkey.-Etymology:...

 high schools.

Later years

While he was a teacher in Konya

Konya

Konya is a city in the Central Anatolia Region of Turkey. The metropolitan area in the entire Konya Province had a population of 1,036,027 as of 2010, making the city seventh most populous in Turkey.-Etymology:...

, he was arrested for a poem he wrote criticizing Atatürk

Mustafa Kemal Atatürk

Mustafa Kemal Atatürk was an Ottoman and Turkish army officer, revolutionary statesman, writer, and the first President of Turkey. He is credited with being the founder of the Republic of Turkey....

's policies and accused of libelling two other journalists. Having served his sentence for several months in Konya and then in the Sinop Fortress Prison

Sinop Fortress Prison

Sinop Fortress Prison, was a state prison situated in the inside of the Sinop Fortress in Sinop, Turkey. As one of the oldest prisons of Turkey, it was established in 1887 within the inner fortress of the centuries-old fortification located on the northwestern part of Cape Sinop...

, he was released in 1933 in an amnesty

Amnesty

Amnesty is a legislative or executive act by which a state restores those who may have been guilty of an offense against it to the positions of innocent people, without changing the laws defining the offense. It includes more than pardon, in as much as it obliterates all legal remembrance of the...

 granted to mark the 10th anniversary of the declaration of the Republic of Turkey. He then applied to the Ministry of Education for permission to teach again. After proving his allegiance to Atatürk by writing the poem "Benim Aşkım" (My Love or My Passion), he was assigned to the publications division at the Ministry of Education. Sabahattin Ali married on May 16, 1935 and did his military service in 1936. He was imprisoned again and released in 1944. He also owned and edited a popular weekly newspaper called "Marko Paşa" (Pronounced "Marco Pasha"), together with Aziz Nesin

Aziz Nesin

Aziz Nesin was a famous Turkish writer and humorist of Crimean Tatar origin and author of more than 100 books.-Pseudonyms:...

.

Death

Upon his release from prison, he suffered financial troubles. His request a passport was refused. It is possible that he was killed at the Bulgaria

Bulgaria

Bulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...

n border by Ali Ertekin (an agent who had been paid to help him pass the border) on 2 April 1948. Another hypothesis is that Ertekin handed him over to the security services, and he was killed during interrogation. It is believed he was killed because of his political opinions.

Short stories

• "Değirmen" (1935) (Mill)
• "Kağnı" (1936) (Oxcart)
• "Ses" (1937) (Voice)
• "Yeni Dünya" (1943) (New World)
• "Sırça Köşk" (1947) (The Glass Palace)

Novels

• "Kuyucaklı Yusuf" (1937) (Yusuf from Kuyucak). Kuyucakli Yusuf was made into a movie by Turkish national television.
• "İçimizdeki Şeytan" (1940) (The Devil Inside Us)
• "Kürk Mantolu Madonna" (1943). (Madonna With A Fur Coat)