Ahmet Necip Fazıl Kısakürek | |
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Necip Fazıl
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Born |
İstanbul, Ottoman Empire |
May 26, 1904
Died | May 25, 1983 İstanbul, Turkey |
(aged 78)
Era | 20th-century philosophy |
Region | Islamic Philosophy, Poetry |
School | Sunni Islam, Sufism |
Main interests
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Poetry, Politics, Literature |
Notable ideas
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Founder of Büyük Doğu |
Influences
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Influenced
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Ahmet Necip Fāzıl Kısakürek (May 26, 1904 – May 25, 1983) was a Turkish poet, novelist, playwright, and Islamist ideologue. He is also known simply by his initials NFK. He was noticed by the French philosopher Henri Bergson, who later became his teacher.
In his own words, he was born in "a huge mansion in Çemberlitaş, on one of the streets descending towards Sultanahmet" in 1904. His father was Abdülbaki Fazıl Bey who held several posts including deputy judge in Bursa, public prosecuter in Gebze and finally, judge in Kadıköy. His mother was an emigree from Crete. He was raised at the Çemberlitaş mansion of his paternal grandfather Kısakürekzade Mehmet Hilmi Efendi of Maraş; he was named after his great-grandfather Ahmet Necib, as well as his father, Fazıl.
He studied in many schools during his primary education, including the French School in Gedikpaşa, Robert College of Istanbul, as well as the Naval School. He received religious courses from Ahmed Hamdi of Akseki and science courses from Yahya Kemal at the Naval School but he was actually influenced by İbrahim Aşkî, whom he defined to have "penetrated into deep and private areas in many inner and outer sciences from literature and philosophy to mathematics and physics". İbrahim Aşkî provided his first contact with Sufism even at a "plan of skin over skin". "After completing candidate and combat classes" of Naval School, Kısakürek entered the Philosophy Department of Darülfünûn and graduated from there (1921–1924). One of his closest friends in philosophy was Hasan Ali Yücel.
He studied in Paris for one year with the scholarship provided by the Ministry of National Education (1924–1925), until the scholarship was cancelled. After returning home in 1926, he worked at Holland, Osmanlı and İş Banks (1926–1939), and gave lectures at the Faculty of Linguistics and History and Geography and the State Conservatoire in Ankara and the Academy of Fine Arts in İstanbul (1939–1942). Having established a relation with the press in his youth, Kısakürek quit civil service to earn his living from writing and magazines.