Education and Academic Career
Suçin graduated from Ankara University’s Faculty of Languages, History and Geography in 1993 with a degree in Arabic Language and Literature. His undergraduate dissertation combined a study of Kahlil Gibran’s literary career with a Turkish translation of al-Arwāḥ al-Mutamarrida (Spirits Rebellious). At Gazi University, his master’s research explored the short fiction of the Egyptian writer Yahya Haqqi (1998), while his doctoral dissertation examined equivalence and translation strategies between Arabic and Turkish at both lexical and phraseological levels (2004). Both projects were supervised by Professor Azmi Yüksel.
Before entering academia, Suçin worked as a translator and interpreter at the Embassy of Kuwait in Ankara from 1993 to 1998. He joined Gazi University in 1998, becoming an assistant professor in 2007, an associate professor in 2011, and a full professor in 2017. In 2005–06, he was a visiting fellow at the Centre for Translation and Intercultural Studies at the University of Manchester. He chaired Gazi University’s Department of Arabic Language Education from 2012 to 2014 and again from 2019 to 2023.
His academic work centres on Arabic literature, translation studies, and the teaching of Arabic as a foreign language. From 2010 to 2012, he chaired the commission responsible for developing Türkiye’s Arabic curricula for primary and secondary education in alignment with the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR). Through these curricula, textbooks, and teachers’ guides, he helped place Arabic language education in Türkiye on a more contemporary, communicative footing.
Writing and Research
At the heart of Suçin’s writing lies a sustained inquiry into the ways language and culture reshape one another. In Öteki Dilde Var Olmak (Being in the Other Language), Dünden Bugüne Arapçaya Çevirinin Serüveni (The Journey of Translation into Arabic), and Haber Çevirisi (News Translation), he approaches translation not simply as linguistic transfer, but as a site where history, literature, and cultures meet. Aktif Arapça (Active Arabic), together with the curricula and teaching materials he has produced for different levels, reflects a parallel commitment to communication, task-based learning, and cultural context in language education.
His articles and book chapters, published in Turkish, Arabic, and English, address the reception of Arabic literature in Turkish, the circulation of Turkish literature in Arabic, poetry translation, translation criticism, and Arabic pedagogy. His study of Nâzım Hikmet’s influence on Arab poetry appeared in an international volume on Turkish literature as world literature. Across this body of work, scholarly inquiry is joined by a distinctly literary sensibility and an effort to recover the shared memory of two literary traditions.
Literary Translation Across Fifteen Centuries
Suçin’s work as a translator traces an arc from pre-Islamic Arabic poetry to the fiction and poetry of the present. In Yedi Askı Şiirleri (The Seven Mu‘allaqāt), he sought to make the canonical odes live as poetry in Turkish. İnsanın Şarkısı (The Song of Man), his selection from al-Mutanabbi, brings the poet’s commanding voice and intellectual tension into contemporary Turkish. His translations of Ibn Hazm’s Güvercin Gerdanlığı (The Ring of the Dove), Ibn Tufayl’s Hayy bin Yakzan (Hayy ibn Yaqzan), and Ibn al-Kalbi’s Putlar Kitabı (The Book of Idols) similarly open classical works to modern readers while preserving their historical texture.
His translations of modern Arabic literature encompass poetry, fiction, and intellectual prose. He has translated several collections by Mahmoud Darwish—including Mural, I Don’t Want This Poem to End, Why Did You Leave the Horse Alone?, and Like Almond Blossoms or Beyond—as well as works by Adonis, Nizar Qabbani, Mohammed Bennis, Nouri al-Jarrah, Najwan Darwish, and Kahlil Gibran. His major prose translations include Ghassan Kanafani’s Men in the Sun, Adania Shibli’s Minor Detail, and Naguib Mahfouz’s The Awakening of the Mummy.
The movement has never been one-way. Suçin has also translated selections from Yunus Emre and Ahmad Yasawi, Talât Sait Halman’s A Millennium of Turkish Literature, and works by modern Turkish poets into Arabic. Translation thus becomes, in his practice, a reciprocal act of recognition: a way for Arabic- and Turkish-speaking readers to encounter—and reconsider—one another’s literary worlds.
Translation and “Poeticity”
For Suçin, translating poetry involves far more than carrying meaning from one language to another. A poem’s voice, rhythm, imagery, emotional resonance, and cultural memory must be reconstituted as a new poetic whole in the receiving language. He uses the term “poeticity” for the qualities that allow a translated poem to live and act as a poem. The concept marks out a middle ground between mechanical fidelity to the source and unconstrained rewriting, with the aesthetic vitality of the poem in the target language as its central concern.
In his 2025 article “Strategic Choices and ‘Poeticity’ in Poetry Translation: An Evaluation of Shakespeare and Imru’ al-Qays Translations,” Suçin develops this approach through six interrelated dimensions: balance of content; time, place, and tradition; emotion and harmony; communicative value; poetic sensibility; and linguistic-aesthetic balance. The concept has since entered discussions of artificial intelligence and literary translation, as well as scholarly assessments of his Turkish translations of al-Mutanabbi.
International Service and Translation Workshops
In 2014, Suçin served as a judge for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction, often known as the “Arabic Booker.” He has also contributed to the judging and advisory work of the Sheikh Hamad Award for Translation and International Understanding and served on the Scientific Committee of the Sheikh Zayed Book Award. These roles reflect the international reach of his scholarship and his sustained engagement with contemporary Arab literary and publishing culture.
Since 2012, he has led Arabic–Turkish literary and poetry translation workshops in Turkey and abroad. From the literary translation workshops held on Büyükada in Istanbul to translator-training programmes in Amman, he has worked closely with emerging translators across a range of settings. His involvement in community interpreting and interpreter education extends this commitment beyond literature, underscoring translation’s ethical and practical role in public life and intercultural communication.
Selected Honours
Suçin’s contributions to literary translation and intercultural exchange have been recognised with major honours in Türkiye and internationally.
| Year | Honour | Citation |
| 2024 | Sharjah Translation Award “Turjuman” | For his Turkish translation of Ibn Hazm’s The Ring of the Dove |
| 2022 | Achievement Award, Sheikh Hamad Award for Translation and International Understanding | For his lifetime contribution to translation and intercultural understanding |
| 2022 | Dünya Kitap Best Translation of the Year Award | For his Turkish translation of Adania Shibli’s Minor Detail |
| 2016 | Turkish Writers’ Union Translation Award | For his Turkish translation of Nizar Qabbani’s The Book of Love |
| 2010 | TÜBİTAK International Publication Incentive Award | For an article published in the Australian Journal of Linguistics |
Selected Works
Authored books: Öteki Dilde Var Olmak (Being in the Other Language); Dünden Bugüne Arapçaya Çevirinin Serüveni (The Journey of Translation into Arabic); Haber Çevirisi (News Translation: Turkish–Arabic / Arabic–Turkish); Aktif Arapça (Active Arabic).
Selected translations of classical literature: Yedi Askı Şiirleri (The Seven Mu‘allaqāt); al-Mutanabbi, İnsanın Şarkısı (The Song of Man); Ibn Hazm, Güvercin Gerdanlığı (The Ring of the Dove); Ibn Tufayl, Hayy bin Yakzan (Hayy ibn Yaqzan); Ibn al-Kalbi, Putlar Kitabı (The Book of Idols).
Selected translations of modern literature: Mahmoud Darwish, Mural and Badem Çiçekleri Gibi yahut Daha Ötesi (Like Almond Blossoms or Beyond); Adonis, İşte Budur Benim Adım (This Is My Name); Ghassan Kanafani, Güneşteki Adamlar (Men in the Sun); Adania Shibli, Küçük Bir Ayrıntı (Minor Detail); Naguib Mahfouz, Mumyanın Uyanışı (The Awakening of the Mummy); Najwan Darwish, Kudüs’ün Kapısında Kelimeler (Words at the Gate of Jerusalem).
Selected translations from Turkish into Arabic: Selections from Yunus Emre; selections from Ahmad Yasawi’s Dīvān-i Ḥikmet; Talât Sait Halman, A Millennium of Turkish Literature: A Concise History.