He started writing regularly in 1974. His first novel, "Karanlık ve Işık" ("Darkness and Light") was a co-winner of the 1979 Milliyet Press Novel Contest (Mehmet Eroğlu was the other winner). This novel was published with the title "Cevdet Bey ve Oğulları" ("Mr. Cevdet and His Sons") in 1982, and won the Orhan Kemal Novel Prize in 1983. It tells the story of three generations of a wealthy Istanbul family living in Nişantaşı, the district of Istanbul where Pamuk grew up.