Turkish novelist sues Netflix series for plagiarism

ISTANBUL

Prominent Turkish novelist Buket Uzuner has sued the producer of a Netflix TV series on the grounds that the characters were copied without her permission.

Applying to an Istanbul court, Uzuner claimed that the characters in the television series “Atiye” (The Gift) were used without permission from her novel “Toprak” in the “Adventures of Defne Kaman” series and that they were plagiarized without a contract.

An injunction has been requested to stop the broadcast of the series in the petition submitted to the court, and a total of 51,000 Turkish Liras ($6,600) compensation with the legal interest has also been requested from the producer’s company and Netflix.

Speaking to daily Hürriyet, Uzuner revealed that a producer had called her and said he wanted to shoot a Netflix series with a female character like Defne Kaman, adding that she spoke to the producer for eight months.

“When I watched the series, I saw that the characters in the book were copied exactly,” she said.

“We have to fight for theft of ideas just as we fight for freedom of thought,” Uzuner added.

Lead actress Beren Saat, who is among Turkey’s highest-paid talents, plays a young Istanbul artist named Atiye, whose life changes when she encounters an archaeologist in the series.

The storyline is centered around a discovery that Atiye makes at the site of Göbeklitepe, the world’s first temple which dates back to 10,000 B.C., where secrets of her past are hidden.