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Erkek, Hasan

HASAN ERKEK is a playwright, poet and professor of drama. He has published 25 artistic and academic books in twelve different countries and has received more than eighteen prizes. His published academic work focuses on the art of drama, while both his academic and creative work has a strong focus on theatre for children.

His plays have been performed at more than 38 theatres including Turkish National Theatres and six in other countries. Approximately twenty of his radio plays have been broadcast by national radio stations in Turkey. Some of his film scripts have been filmed.

Hasan Erkek has taken part and presented papers in many international theatre festivals, and more than a hundred of his articles have been published in various journals and newspapers. He has given courses in various faculties on play-reading, dramaturgy, dramatisation, creative writing, drama techniques and contemporary theatre.

He has served as an Executive Board Member and Vice-president in ASSITEJ Turkey, as the president of Turkish Playwrights and Play Translators Association and as the Head of the Department of Performing Arts at Anadolu University.

PRINCESS FLOWER is a charming play suitable for children aged eight and above, with an appropriate and modern message based on a traditional theme and taking about an hour to perform. Originally written in Turkish, it has been performed in Turkey and is in the repertoire of both the State Theatres and the City Theatres of Istanbul. In 2006 it won an award from the following bodies: ASSITEJ (International Association of Theatre for Children and Young People), ITI (International Theatre Institute) and IPF (International Playwrights Forum).

In the mythical Land of Flowers, where people earn their living by growing flowers, the seventeen-year-old Flower Princess, Lily, is waiting for the time of the flower harvest to marry Snapdragon, the Flower Prince. But her mother, Queen Rose, falls and breaks her leg. Her father, King Bluebell, is so upset that he issues a command forbidding women to go out to work anymore. They should stay at home engaged in housework.

Soon all the flowers wither and die and even their seeds are useless. The king talks to the queen about what to do: “I should go to the Land of Giants to get more seeds, but I am old for the journey. If we only had a son, he could go to the Land of Giants for me.”

Princess Flower, overhearing this, is hurt. “I can go!” With her parents’ consent, so she does, riding her horse, Benny. They have many adventures, meeting creatures whom they help and who help them (a pair of nightingales, a buck and a hind, two white eagles, a female rabbit). Finally, in the Land of Giants, the Flower Princess is told, “If men and women work equally”, then the flowers will bloom again.

She returns home with new seeds, given by the King and Queen of the Land of Giants and conveys this message. The king, her father, rescinds his command. Men and women work together again in the flower fields and elsewhere. The princess marries Snapdragon, Prince Flower. Her father makes her Queen (with the consent of the people). The new Queen states that she would like Snapdragon, Prince Flower, to reign with her. There is dancing and rejoicing and the play ends.

You can purchase 'Princess Flower' online from the following link:

https://www.createspace.com/6186169

At the Poetry Festival, held at Curtea D'Arges, Romania, in July 2016, Hasan Erkek was awarded the European Grand Prize for Poetry. A video of his acceptance speech can be seen on our facebook page (www.facebook.com/ProversePress).

We congratulate Hasan Erkek on this additional achievement!

A reading by Proverse publisher, Verner Bickley, of the English translation of Erkek's poem, 'Emptiness' can also be found on our facebook page.

To know more about Proverse, submitting a publishing proposal to Proverse, and/or entering for the international Proverse Prize for unpublished book-length non-fiction, fiction or poetry and/or the international Proverse Poetry Prize, browse the Proverse website: http://www.proversepublishing.com or take a look at the publishers' pages which are included in most Proverse books.

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