The Kazakh poet Abai Qunanbaiuly (1845–1904) today enjoys a dual legacy as the father of modern Kazakh literature (as distinct from its oral tradition) and also as an enlightener who translated the Russian classics into Kazakh and acted as a vital bridge between the two cultures. Much of Abai's reputation owes its existence to the twentieth-century author, critic, and scholar Mukhtar Auezov (1897–1961), whose biographical writings on the poet formed the standard narrative of his life and work. Initiated in 1937, the year of the Pushkin centennial celebrations in the Soviet Union, Auezov's literary canonization of Abai hinges on the poet's acquisition of the Russian language and his transformative encounters with Russian-language texts – most notably among them, Pushkin's Dubrovskii and Evgenii Onegin. In Auezov's account, Abai's efforts lead to the discovery of an authentically Kazakh literary voice, heralded by his successful adaptation of Pushkin's Evgenii Onegin into traditional Kazakh song form. In analyzing this prominent episode of the Abai legend, I argue that Russian literature's “conquest” in Central Asia was in fact a multifaceted dialogue in which writers laid the foundation for distinct national literary traditions by appropriating the literature of the colonizer – and in particular by reading, translating, displacing, domesticating, and “disorienting” the figure of Pushkin.
Oskar Schmerling (1863–1938) was a Tbilisi-based artist best known for his illustrations and caricatures in Armenian, Azeri, Georgian, and Russian-language satirical periodicals during the Russian Empire’s post-1905 “press boom.” His work provided a powerful visual component to hotly debated issues of the day, including language policy, ethnic conflict, educational reform, religious practices, Russian cultural and political hegemony, and more. In this article we analyze Schmerling’s use of two satirical personae—the titular devil from the Georgian journal eshmakis matrakhi (Devil’s Whip) and the mullah from the Azeri journal Molla Näsräddin—in light of the diverse cultural and religious communities that comprised his readership and intellectual milieu. Drawing from scholarship on trickster figures in oral, print, and performative genres around the world, we investigate the ways Schmerling used the personae of the devil and the mullah to simultaneously represent the world from more than one perspective, and to speak to communities with varying political agendas in the midst of a collapsing empire. We argue that Schmerling’s work reveals cross-cultural artistic and intellectual connections that contributed to significant political and cultural change in the South Caucasus, culminating in revolutionary activity and the rise of nationalist movements.
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