FERİDUN ZAİMOĞLU, poet, visual artist
Feridun Zaimoglu (born 4 December 1964 in Bolu/Turkey) is a poet and visual artist of German Turkish origin.
Zaimoglu has developed since 1995 to have become one of the important poets of contemporary German language. His central theme are the problems of the second and third generation of Turkish immigrants to Germany.
Feridun Zaimoglu, came in 1965 with his parents to Germany. He lived until 1985 in Berlin and Munich, and then began studying Medicine and Arts in Kiel where he continues to live. Today, he works as poet and journalist. His essays and critiques of literary have appeared in leading German newspapers like i.e. DIE ZEIT, Die Welt, SPEX and the Tagesspiegel. From 1999 to 2000 he was working in Mannheim at the National theatre. In 2003 he became Island poet on the island of Sylt, and in 2004 he was a visiting fellow at the Freie Universität Berlin.
Zehra Cirak was born in Istanbul in 1960. She has lived in Germany since 1963, and since 1982 in Berlin. She writes lyric poetry in German and has won many prizes for her work, including the Hölderlin-Förderpreis for Lyric Poetry in 1994, the Adalbert-von-Chemisso-Preis in 2001. Her first collection of poetry, ‘Flugfänger’, was published in 1987. This was followed by two collections of poetry and short stories. Her fourth collection of poetry, ‘Liebesübungen’ was published in the year 2000.
Prof.(Hon.) Architect Askin Ozcan has recently published three of his books, in the U.S.A.