Cemal Süreya Biography

Cemâl Süreya was a poet and writer.

After the 1938 Dersim Rebellion, Sureya and his family were forcefully deported to Bilecik, a Turkish city in western Anatolia. This had a significant effect on his poems.

He graduated from the Political Sciences Faculty of Ankara University. He was the editor-in-chief of the Papirus literary magazine. Cemal Süreya is a notable member of the Second New Generation of Turkish poetry, an abstract and postmodern movement created as a backlash against the more popular-based Garip movement. Love, mainly through its erotic character, is a popular theme of Süreya's works. Süreya's poems and articles were published in magazines such as Yeditepe, Yazko, Pazar Postası, Yeni Ulus, Oluşum, Türkiye Yazıları, Politika, Aydınlık, and Somut. He is known to have been a primary influence on the poetry of Sunay Akın. He lost a letter "y" from his surname because of a challenge with Sezai Karakoç (also a Turkish poet).