AKMEN, Üstün

Storywriter, writer of travel literature and critic (b. 2 July 1943, İstanbul). He attended the Şişli 19 Mayıs Primary School, Private Italian High School and the School of Commerce, and graduated from İstanbul University, Faculty of Economics. He worked at the Koçtaş Trade Company Inc. of Koç Group between 1969 and 1984. He was transferred to Tekfen Foreign Trade Company as the assistant general director in 1984. He became the shareholder, a member of the executive board and the general director of Media Promotion and Distribution Inc. which was founded under the newspaper Cumhuriyet in 1995. He became the general director of Cumhuriyet and the chairman of Cumhuriyet Book Club in 1997; meanwhile he became the editor-in-chief of Cumhuriyet Books. He left the newspaper Cumhuriyet in 2001, and over a year he worked as a media and audience coordinator in İstanbul Municipal Theaters and then he continued as the general editor of publishing. He became the chairman of Türkiye Center to the International PEN Clubs Federation and the general director of Can Publications between 2001 and 2005.

He embarked on writing in 1963. His first short stories, articles, poems and essays were published in reviews such as Evrim, Dönem, Yeni Ufuklar, Yeni İnsan, Otağ, Yeni Dergi, Nokta and A. Later on, his articles were published in the review Soyut. He adopted and used a free style, the power of imagination and a free way of understanding in form. Since 1988, he has written his impressions on his travels in a column titled “Pazar Yazıları” (Sunday Articles) in the newspaper Cumhuriyet. He wrote articles on music in the review Andante, and play critics in the review Tiyatro….

WORKS:

TRAVEL LITERATURE-ESSAY:
Çarşafın Gizlediği Dişilik (The Feminity Hidden under the Sheets, 1991), Bir Günlük Dost (One-day Friend, 1998).

SHORT STORY: Suçsuz Laleler (The Innocent Tulips, 1996), Kör Bakkalın Gözleri (The Eyes of the Blind Grocer, 1999), Yarim Nereyi Mesken Tuttun (My Beloved One, Where Did
You Settle, 2000).

CRITICISM: ...Vee Perdeee (...and Action, 2000), Üçüncü Zil (Third Bell, 2001), Maskenin Öteki Yüzü (The Other Face of the Mask, 2002).

NOVEL: Provasız Yaşam (Life without a Rehearsal, 2005).