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Burhan Sönmez

ブルハン・ソンメズ

Burhan Sönmez

Profile

Gender
Male
Born
1965-01-01 （Haymana, Ankara, Turkey）
Nationality
Turkish, British
Languages
Turkish, Kurdish, English
Residence History
Cambridge, United Kingdom → Istanbul, Turkey

Career

Occupations
Author, Novelist, Lawyer, Translator, Lecturer
Active Years
2009-
Affiliations
Hughes Hall, University of Cambridge - Senior Member / By-Fellow, PEN International (President), TAKSAV (Foundation for Social Research, Culture and Art) - co-founder, Human Rights Association (IHD) - former member, BirGün (co-founder, daily newspaper)
Memberships
PEN International (member; President), Human Rights Association (IHD)
Nominations
Premio Strega Europeo (shortlisted, 2023), International Dublin Literary Award (longlisted, 2024)

Awards

Disturbing the Peace (Vaclav Havel Center)
2017
Organization: Vaclav Havel Center
Result: 受賞
EBRD Literature Prize
2018
Work: Istanbul Istanbul
Organization: EBRD (European Bank for Reconstruction and Development)
Result: 受賞
Sedat Simavi Literature Prize
2011
Work: Sins and Innocents
Organization: Sedat Simavi Foundation
Result: 受賞
Orhan Kemal Novel Award
2022
Work: Stone and Shadow
Organization: Orhan Kemal Novel Award (organizers)
Result: 受賞
British Audio Awards (Audiobook category)
2025
Work: Lovers of Franz K. (English unabridged audiobook)
Category: Crime & Thriller（オーディオ）
Organization: British Audio Awards
Result: ショートリスト

Awards & Nominations

Works

Major Works

North (Kuzey)

2009 Novel; philosophical fable

A young man, whose father left when he was two and returns twenty years later as a corpse, sets out to uncover his father's identity. His quest becomes a search for his own identity. Woven with Eastern folktales and legends, it is a fable-like, philosophical novel exploring questions of existence and self.

identitymemoryfolkloreexistentialism
Translations
  • English translation available

Sins and Innocents (Masumlar)

2011 Novel

Two people meet in a foreign land: a woman who carries a 'book' and believes in poetry, and a man suffering from insomnia who struggles through graves. Each hides a secret and a sin. The narrative moves across the Haymana Plain, Tehran and Cambridge, weaving themes of guilt, healing and memory.

sinmemoryencounterredemption
Translations
  • English translation available

Istanbul Istanbul

2015 Novel; city novel

Four prisoners held in underground cells tell stories about Istanbul to each other to pass time between episodes of torture. The subterranean narratives gradually become stories of the city above ground. Through personal tales, the novel portrays the multifaceted city of Istanbul, addressing themes of love, politics and memory.

cityconfinementmemorystorytellinglove & politics
Translations
  • English translation available

Labyrinth

2018 Novel; memory & identity

Boratin, a blues singer, attempts suicide by jumping off the Bosphorus Bridge but wakes up in hospital with memory loss. He cannot recall why he tried to die and only remembers unrelated fragments, confusing their chronology. The novel interrogates whether bodily recognition or memory of the past constructs identity, blending Borgesian micro-stories with an exploration of collective and personal memory.

memory lossidentitypast vs forgettingmusic
Translations
  • English translation available

Stone and Shadow

2021 Novel; historical/social novel

Through Avdo, a tombstone craftsman, the novel traces the social history of modern Turkey. Orphaned in Mardin and taught stone-carving by an Assyrian man, Avdo's life intersects with Christians, Sunni Muslims, Alawites, Turks, Kurds and Armenians. The narrative moves through the Ottoman period to the present, assembling fragments of history into a broader map of society.

historycommunitymemoryinterfaith encounters
Translations
  • English translation available

Lovers of Franz K.

2024 Novel; literary thriller

Written in his mother tongue Kurdish, this novel is a thriller of love and literary revenge set across Paris, Istanbul, West Berlin and Tel Aviv during 1968. It engages with student uprisings, debates about Franz Kafka, and a secret group confronting ex-Nazi criminals — a creative obituary for Kafka that mixes romance, politics and metafiction.

literary historyrevengelovepolitics
Adaptations
  • [Audiobook (narration)] Lovers of Franz K. (English unabridged audiobook) (2025)
Translations
  • English translation available (including audiobook)

Bibliography

  • Kuzey (North) — 2009
  • Masumlar (Sins and Innocents) — 2011
  • Istanbul Istanbul — 2015
  • Labyrinth — 2018
  • Taş ve Gölge / Stone and Shadow — 2021
  • Lovers of Franz K. — 2024

Adaptations

  • Lovers of Franz K. English unabridged audiobook (2025 — shortlisted at the British Audio Awards)

Translations by Author

  • Translation into Turkish of William Blake's 'The Marriage of Heaven and Hell'

Translations of Works

  • Works have been translated and published in more than 40 countries, including English translations

Style & Themes

Literary Style
fable-like, philosophical prosedialogue-driven narrativeconcise, suggestive language focusing on memory and confinement
Recurring Motifs
memoryimprisonmentcities (especially Istanbul)storytellingidentityexile

Health

  • Serious injuries sustained from an assault by Turkish police (1996)
    1996（負傷）およびその後の治療・回復
    Led to treatment in the UK, exile and eventual settlement abroad; the experience influenced his later writing and advocacy for human rights.

Legacy

Burhan Sönmez, a Kurdish-Turkish writer, is internationally recognized for novels that explore memory, imprisonment and the city. As President of PEN International he advocates for freedom of expression. His works have been translated in over 40 countries and have won multiple awards.

Academic Societies

  • PEN International
  • Hughes Hall (University of Cambridge)

Quotes

  • The book, Labyrinth, reads like a fever dream. Boratin is a listless existential hero who often drifts through his days with an alienation befitting a Camus protagonist.
    Source: Sarah Lyall (The New York Times) (2019)
  • One of the most exciting, innovative voices.
    Source: Harvard Review (2022)
  • His novels are steeped in imprisonment and memory, with echoes of Fyodor Dostoyevsky and Jorge Luis Borges.
    Source: Jason Farago (The New York Times) (2023)
  • A meditation on the afterlife of a writer.
    Source: Financial Times (2025)

Trivia

  • His mother tongue is Kurdish; he wrote his first five novels in Turkish and the sixth in Kurdish.
  • Elected President of PEN International in 2021 and active in defending freedom of expression.
  • Detained in 1984 as a student and seriously injured in an attack by police in 1996, after which he left Turkey.
  • Co-founder of the daily BirGün and co-founder of the TAKSAV foundation.
  • His novels have been translated and published in more than 40 countries.