Yunus Emre

Turkish poet

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History

Yunus Emre (born c. 1238, Turkey—died c. 1320, Turkey) was a poet and mystic who exercised a powerful influence on Turkish literature.

Though legend obscures the facts of his life, he is known to have been a Sufi (Islamic mystic) who sat for 40 years at the feet of his master, Tapduk Emre. Yunus Emre was well versed in mystical philosophy, especially that of the 13th-century poet and mystic Jalāl ad-Dīn ar-Rūmī. Like Rūmī, Yunus Emre became a leading representative of mysticism in Anatolia but on a more popular level; he was venerated as a saint after his death.

His poems, which are devoted mainly to the themes of divine love and human destiny, are characterized by deep feeling. He wrote in a straightforward, almost austere style and mainly in the traditional syllabic metre of Anatolian folk poetry. His verse had a decisive influence on later Turkish mystics and inspired the poets of the renaissance of Turkish national poetry after 1910.