Oğuz Atay: A guide into postmodern Turkish literature

Oğuz Atay wrote his first novel, Tutunamayanlar, which has been considered one of the masterpieces of 20th century Turkish literature by UNESCO because it introduced modern literature in Turkish book writing. The novel has been compared to Ulysses from James Joyce due to its unique avant-garde style. 

Oğuz Atay (1934–1977) was born in  Kastamonu İnebolu in 1934, a north Turkish region located near the Black Sea. After finishing college in Ankara he studied Civil Engineering in Istanbul Technical University and worked repairing ferries until he entered Istanbul State Academy for Engineering. He began writing some articles and a book called Topography, but his literary career started in 1971 with Tutunamayanlar.

In Tutunamayanlar Atay makes a critique of the bourgeois world including surrealist elements such as inner talks about reality and consciousness. Oğuz Atay’s written art is postmodern and poststructuralist. He introduced Western avant garde in Turkish literature. In some of his books he doesn’t use points, which was very popular for some European avant-garde writers of the 20th century. Psychological analysis of reality and the human being, as well as philosophical and metaphysical topics such as nature. meaning, differentiating reality from fantasy and fiction, truth and human origins are the main and underlying themes of his books. 

Oğuz Atay

Tutunamayanlar was never reprinted during the author’s lifetime, since it didn’t have a good reaction amongst other Turkish writers. But in 1984 it became a best-seller in the country. After publishing his second novel, Tehlikeli Oyunlar, in English Dangerous Games (1973), he became an Associate University Professor. 

Most of his writings are novels, and many of them have been adapted and inspired filmmakers and theater plays such as “Waiting For The Fear”. Appart of novels Atay also wrote one theater play, “Oyunlarla Yaşayanlar”, “Living with Games, which has been interpreted by many theaters such as the Turkish Theatre since the 80s.

“She cannot go out of my mind. My mind went lost, someone stole it.”.

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