Background
Metin Altıok was born in Bergama, İzmir Province, Turkey.
Metin Altıok was born in Bergama, İzmir Province, Turkey.
Metin Altıok studied philosophy at Ankara University.
After graduating he went on working first as a civil servant and subsequently as a teacher. He held teaching posts in various Anatolian cities, and taught for several years at the religious İmam Hatip school in the city of Bingöl. Altıok published his first collection of poems, Gezgin ("Gadding about"), in 1976, which was followed two years later by Yerleşik yabancı ("Settled stranger") and eight additional collections until 1992.
On 2 July 1993 he was killed while attending a cultural festival in the central Turkish city of Sivas, when a group of radical Salafists set fire to the hotel in which the festival was held.
1979: Ahmet Telli Poetry Prize.