ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I wish to express my gratitude to Professor Talat Sait Halman
for encouraging me from the first day he saw my work, for advising
me and using my translations.

I wish also to thank him for the first book of translations of Orhan
Veli, ``I am Listening to Istanbul,'' published by Corinth Press in
1971. One may wonder why another book on Orhan Veli is necessary less 
than twenty years later. I can only say that he needs to be translated 
by each generation. Besides, I had such pleasure doing it.

I wish also thank Professor Halman for his suggestions on he preface
to this book. Any inaccuracies or controversial opinions are my own.

I am grateful to Mr. Theodore Wilentz, the publisher of Corinth Books,
for allowing the poems published in ``I am Listening to Istanbul,''
to appear here in my translation.

I wish to thank Bob Hershon, my editor at Hanging Loose Press, for
his constructive suggestions and for sparing no efforts to make ``I,
Orhan Veli'' th ebest possible book. I also value him as a friend and
a kindred poetic sensibility.

My thanks also to my assoiates on the Committee for International Poetry,
Bob Rosenthal, Marc Nasdor and Simon Pettett, for encouraging me while
I was working on these translations and for being part of an environment
in which contact with poets from all over the world was possible.  My
special thanks to Simon Pettett for his specific  suggestions. 

I am grateful to Ms. Kimberly Lyons of the Poetry Project for giving me 
the opportunity to read some of these translations first at the Project.
In fact, the happy coincidence of my reading on the same evening as
Bob Hershon was the initial impetus for the publication of this book. 
Perhaps coincidence is not the right word, and I must instead thank 
Ms. Lyons' instincts.

Finally, I wicsh to thank my wife, Karen, for being who she is. Her
ssubtle everyday accomodations made my life as a poet possible while 
carrying on with the business of living.

Murat Memet-Nejat
New York City
June, 1988