[3][4] His father (Hüseyin Efendi), originally from the district of Çerkeş in the sanjak of Çankırı,[3] was mostly absent, as he was exiled for being a political foe of the ruling regime; while his mother (Hatice Refia Hanım), a Greek Muslim convert from the island of Chios,[3][5] died when he was very young.

[4] In 1908, after the Young Turk Revolution, he began publishing the newspaper Tanin, which became a strong supporter of the ruling party, the Committee of Union and Progress (Ittihat ve Terakki Cemiyeti, CUP).

He had projects for a new school and magazines, however, due to complications from diabetes he refused to treat, he died in 1915 and was buried in the family plot at Eyüp.

Fikret's volumes of verse include Rubab-ı Şikeste ("The Broken Lute") from 1900, and Haluk'un Defteri ("Haluk's Notebook") from 1911.

Because of his very fiery writings and poetry in which he criticised the Ottoman regime of Abdul Hamid II, he was immortalized as the "freedom poet".