Güzide Taranoğlu

Writer and poet (b. 28 January 1922, İstanbul – d. 2013, Ankara). Her full name is Fatma Güzide Taranoğlu. In some of her works she used her father’s surname, which is Gülpınar. Her family, of which the members are known to be very charitable, emigrated to İstanbul from Skopje after the Balkan War. She attended primary school in Ilgın and secondary school in İstanbul, then she started to work in İstanbul Emlak and Eytam Banks where one of her colleagues was Ziya Osman Saba, a well-known poet of the time, and through her met famous poets such as Yaşar Nabi, Cahit Sıtkı, Melih Cevdet, Yahya Kemal. She has been to Başkale (in Van), Eleşkirt (in Ağrı), Çarşamba (in Samsun), Gülköy (in Ordu) and Giresun with her husband who is a doctor.

In 1961 she settled in Ankara. She joined some associations, primarily as a member of the Central Administrative Board of the Society for the Protection of Children. She was a pioneer of many associations and held poetry exhibitions. Her house was frequently visited by artists. She donated all of her books to the Ministry of Culture on the condition that the books would be sent to Güzelyalı, a town in Ordu. After that the Güzide Gülpınar Taranoğlu Public Library was opened in Güzelyalı. In addition, her name has been given to a boulevard and a bus stop in the same town.

Her works appeared in the newspapers Yeni Tanin, where she prepared the arts section for a while and in Zafer, where she worked as a columnist and also in the magazine Gülpınar, which she has been publishing regularly since 1976. Although she didn’t always use syllabic meter in her poems, all the poems she wrote that were regarded as successful and published in the magazine Çaba were in syllabic meter.

The poem above and more than a hundred of her poems have been set to music by composers such as Alaattin Yavaşça, Muzaffer İlkar, Erol Sayan, Sabri Süha Ansen and Turgut Aksoy in various styles of Turkish music. Some of her poems that have been set to music are as follows: Bir Şarkı Yazdım Sana (I Have Composed a Song for You), Yıllar Yılı Sana Aşk, Sana Sevgi Taşıdım (For Years I Have Kept Love in My Heart for You), Ağlasan Söz Olur, Gülsen Söz Olur (You are Criticized Whether you Weep or Laugh), Güzelsin Doyulmaz Bir Çiçek Gibi (You are as Beautiful as a Flower).

WORKS:

POETRY: Merhaba Dostum (Hello My Friend, 1967), Mutlu Acı (Happy Sorrow, 1968), Tozpembe (Light Pink, 1969), İnsanlar Mutlu Yaşasın (Let People Live Happily, 1972), Ve Mutluluk Çiçek Açar (And Happiness Flourishes, 1975), Umutlar Canda Çiçek (Hopes are the Flowers of the Soul, 1984), Huzur Çağı (Era of Presence, 1981), Aşk Yıllara Yenilmez (Love Endures Years, 1989), Can Parçamız Çocuklar (Children, a Part of Our Bodies And Souls, 1993), Şiiristan’da Hecelerin Dili (The Language of the Syllables in the Land of Poetry, 1997), Bir Dalda Bin Çiçek (Thousands of Flowers on a Single Branch, 1997, a collection of her previous poems), Aşk + Şiir = Hayat (Love + Poem = Life, 2002), Sevgi Yağmur Aşk Güneş (Affection is the Rain, Love is the Sun, 2003).

APHORISM: Diyorum ki (I Say That, 1976).

ANTHOLOGY: Aldanışlar Geçidi (Parade of Deceptions, 1978).

ESSAY: Selamlarım (I Greet, 1996).