No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
The Soviet Intrepretation of Two Lines by an Asian Poet
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 March 2019
Extract
In the study and exegesis of the works of older Asian classical poets and writers the Soviets have made concentrated efforts to publish Marxian interpretations of the literature in a way which will be harmonious with Soviet ideology.
A case in point is Mir Ali Shir Nevai, (1440-1501), who is regarded by Turcologists throughout the world as one of the most important writers influencing the development of Turkic literature and Turkic literary languages. He lived and wrote most of his life in Herat, then the intellectual center and capital of the Timurid dynasty in what is now part of Afghanistan, Iran, and Soviet Central Asia.
- Type
- Research Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies 1957
References
1 The celebration was not held in 1941, though some materials had already been prepared or published for the event. The official Soviet celebration was held in 1948. A previous observance of Nevai's 500th anniversary had been made in Azerbaijan in 1926, on a i date calculated according to the Moslem calendar. Certain works published in Azerbaijan (Baku) for this commemoration were soon criticized by Russian scholars in the symposium Mir-Ali-Shir, sbornik k pjatistoletiju so dnja rozhdenija (Leningrad: Izdatel'stvo Akademii nauk, SSSR, 1928).
2 “The Five-Hundredth Anniversary of the Birth of the Uzbek Poet,” International Litera- • ture, No. 7 (1940), p. 117. It should be noted that some local Uzbek writers had accepted Nevai as an Uzbek poet long before 1940.
3 “Nevai,” Bol'shaja sovetskaja enciklopedija, XLI (1939), 434.
4 Kissen, I. A., i Koblov, K. S., Uzbekskij Jaztk, (Tashkent: Gosudarstvennoe uchebnopedagogicheskoe izdatel'stvo UzSSR 1941), p . 154.
5 Klimovich, L. I , “Navoi i dve poemy ego ‘Pjatericy',” Oktjabr', No 4, (1945), p. 161.
6 Bertel's , E. E., Navoi (Moscow-Leningrad: Izdatel'stvo Akademiinauk SSSR, 1948), p. 158. This author states that the Nevai couplet shows that “ … it is necessary to be ruthless toward anyone who humiliates or oppresses a man.“
7 Aibek i Deich, A., “Alisher Navoi i ego vremja,” Novyj mix, No. 5 (1948), p. 244. In this article the writers introduce the Nevai couplet to show that those in power must care for the “people.“
8 Kary-Nijazov, T. N., Ocherki istorii kulturv Sovetskogo Vzbekistana. (Moscow: Izdatel'stvo Akademii nauk SSSR, 1955), p. 34 Google Scholar.
9 Mir Ali Shir Nevai, “Hayratu ‘1-abrar,” (Istanbul: Ayasofya museum manuscript No. 4333, copied 903 H.), 97a:9. (Acknowledgement is due the Ayasofya librarian, Mr. Ibrahim Mutlu, for help in locating the material.) :B
10 Donne, John, “Devotions upon emergent occasions,” Complete Poetry and Selected Prm. John Hayward ed. (London: Nonesuch Press; New York: Random House, 1946), XVII, 538.
11 Bertel's E. E., op cit., P. 171. Bertel's gives the name of the work and the number of the line cited (2740). The mansucript is not identified. He writes that “In condensed form Khairat al-abrar contains all the basic aspects of Navoi's world outlook and the huge signi ficance of the poem lies in this.“
12 Although Soviet writers minimize the influence of Arabic and Persian languages and cultures on the literature of Nevai the couplet cited in this article gives evidence of his cosmopolitan creative background. Besides the Turkic, words such as adami (human), khalq (mankind) and ghamm (sorrow) are elements from Arabic. The poetic meter is also Arabic. Other such indications can be found in the context of this poem.