Notes on the relationship between "Variations On a Poem of Karacaoğlan" and the traditional folk poetry

Abstract

The relationship between Turkish poetry of the republican era and traditional folk poetry has always been of great concern. Within this context, one example to deal with is Melih Cevdet Anday's long poem, "Variations On a Poem of Karacaoǧlan". Anday is known of having aimed to establish a link between traditional folk poetry of Karacaoǧlan and his own poetica via this poem. Although his effort is remarkable, the link he had tried to establish is weak because of two reasons: First, the distinctions between the oral and the written culture leads to a difficulty in terms of the reproduction of traditional folk poetry within modern poetry. Secondly, there lies an eclecticism in Anday's usage of Karacaoǧlan's poem.