Murat Özyaşar: Yellow Laughter

A prose writer, native of the Kurdish capital of Diyarbakır. Born in 1979, he studied Turkish language and literature at the Faculty of Education at Tigrid University and worked as a teacher in the Diyarbakır suburbs for 10 years. Together with his students, he published the magazine Hışt Hışt. After an unsuccessful attempt at a military coup in 2016, he was deprived of his teaching post and imprisoned as a part of subsequent extensive cleansings. He publishes his short stories in the leading Turkish literary magazines Varlık [Present] and Kitap-lık [Library]. His book debut, Ayna Çarpması [Mirror Shake], won him two of the most prestigious Turkish literary awards: the Yunus Nadi Prize and the Haldun Taner Prize. His second book is called Sarı Kahkaha [Yellow Laughter].