Nazim Hikmet

Biography

Nâzım Hikmet Ran (15 January 1902 – 3 June 1963), commonly known as Nâzım Hikmet (Turkish pronunciation: [naːˈzɯm hicˈmet] ( listen)) was a Turkish poet, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, director and memoirist. He was acclaimed for the "lyrical flow of his statements". Described as a "romantic communist"and "romantic revolutionary", he was repeatedly arrested for his political beliefs and spent much of his adult life in prison or in exile. His poetry has been translated into more than fifty languages.

According to Nâzım Hikmet, he was of paternal Turkish and maternal German, Polish, Georgian, Circassian and French descent. Nâzım Hikmet's mother came from a distinguished, cosmopolitan family with predominantly Circassian (Adyghe) roots, along with high social position and relations to Polish nobility. From his father's side, he had Turkish heritage. His father, Hikmet Bey, was the son of Çerkes Nâzım Pasha, after whom Nâzım Hikmet was named. His mother, Ayşe Celile Hanım, was of 3/8 Circassian, 2/8 Polish, 1/8 Serbian, 1/8 German, 1/8 French (Huguenot) ancestry. Nazım’s maternal grandfather, Hasan Enver Pasha, was the son of Polish Mustafa Celalettin Pasha and Saffet Hanım who was born to Serbian Omar Pasha and Circassian Adviye Hanım (daughter of Çerkes Hafız Pasha). Mustafa Celalettin Pasha (born Konstanty Borzęcki herbu Półkozic) authored "Les Turcs anciens et modernes" in Constantinople (present-day Istanbul), in 1869. This is considered one of the first works of national Turkist political thought. Nâzım Hikmet's maternal grandmother, Leyla Hanım, was the daughter of Mehmet Ali Pasha, of French (Huguenot) and German origin, and Circassian Ayşe Sıdıka Hanım who was also a daughter of Çerkes Hafız Pasha.His uncle, Enver Celalettin Pasha, was a member of the Ottoman Army General Staff. Nâzım Hikmet and Celile Hanım's cousins include Oktay Rifat Horozcu, a leading Turkish poet, and the statesman Ali Fuat Cebesoy, among others.

This text is based on the copyrighted Wikipedia article; it is used under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License