Yakup Kadri Karaosmanoğlu

Yakup Kadri Karaosmanoğlu (also rendered Yakub Kadri; [jaːˈkup kadˈɾi kaˈɾaosmanoːɫu]; 27 March 1889 – 13 December 1974) was a Turkish novelist, journalist, diplomat, and member of parliament.

Yakup Kadri (يعقوب قدرى‎) was born in Cairo on 27 March 1889.He was the son of Abdülkadir Bey, a member of the Karaosmanoğulları family [tr] which started to gain a reputation in the 17th century around the Manisa region.His mother was İkbal Hanım, a woman in İsmail Paşa's palace community.Until the age of six, he was raised in Cairo, after which his family moved to their homeland, Manisa.He completed his primary education in Manisa, and in 1903, the family moved to İzmir.He was journalist with İkdam during the Turkish War of Independence and after the establishment of the Republic of Turkey in 1923, a representative of Manisa to the Grand National Assembly from 1931 to 1934.From 1934 to 1955, he was a diplomat in various European and Middle Eastern capitals.

Following his return to Turkey, he worked in journalism and was the editor of Ulus in 1957.In 1961, he was a representative of the constituent assembly of the National Unity Committee following the 1960 coup d'état.His last political position was again as a representative of Manisa to the Grand National Assembly from 1961 to 1965.In 1966, he was elected chairman of the Anadolu Agency.

He died at the Gülhane Military Medical Academy [tr; de] in Ankara on 13 December 1974. He was buried next to his mother's tomb in Yahya Efendi Cemetery [tr] in Istanbul.

Yakup Kadri's first work was published in 1913.His novel Yaban (Stranger, 1932) depicts the bitter experiences of a Turkish intellectual, Ahmet Celal, in the countryside after losing his arm in the Battle of Gallipoli. Though categorized as naturalist, the novel has a romantic, anti-pastoral quality.

His novel Panorama analyzes the political, social, and economical changes during the transition period from the Ottoman Empire to the modern Republic of Turkey. It is considered to be a "generation novel" as the story is based on the lives of several generations of the same family during this transitional period.

He was one of the theorists of the Kadro movement.