Hamid Mammadtaghi oglu Arasly ( az, Həmid Hacı Məmmədtağı oğlu Araslı; 23 February 1902–20 November 1983) was an
Azerbaijani literary critic,
Doctor of Sciences
Doctor of Sciences ( rus, доктор наук, p=ˈdoktər nɐˈuk, abbreviated д-р наук or д. н.; uk, доктор наук; bg, доктор на науките; be, доктар навук) is a higher doctoral degree in the Russi ...
in
Philology
Philology () is the study of language in oral and written historical sources; it is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics (with especially strong ties to etymology). Philology is also defined as th ...
, and an academic at the
Azerbaijan National Academy of Sciences
Azerbaijan National Academy of Sciences (ANAS) ( az, Azərbaycan Milli Elmlər Akademiyası (AMEA)), located in Baku, is the main state research organization and the primary body that conducts research and coordinates activities in the fields of ...
. He is acknowledged as one of the most prominent literary critics and philologists of Azerbaijan.
Hamid Arasly has conducted extensive critical research of the works of well-known
Azerbaijani and
Persian
Persian may refer to:
* People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language
** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples
** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...
poets as
Nizami Ganjavi
Nizami Ganjavi ( fa, نظامی گنجوی, lit=Niẓāmī of Ganja, translit=Niẓāmī Ganjavī; c. 1141–1209), Nizami Ganje'i, Nizami, or Nezāmi, whose formal name was ''Jamal ad-Dīn Abū Muḥammad Ilyās ibn-Yūsuf ibn-Zakkī'',Mo'in ...
,
Fuzûlî, as well as
Imamaddin Nasimi.
He has authored multiple works on Azerbaijani literary history. One of his most important contributions to his field is the release of the first full-text Russian edition of the
Book of Dede Korkut in 1939.
His period of activity corresponds with
heightened repression in the Soviet Union. In 1936, using the eastern manuscripts he had been collecting for a few years, Hamid Arasly created the Manuscripts Bureau within the Azerbaijan National Academy of Sciences. However, a year later, some of the manuscripts preserved in the bureau were found to be against the principles of
Soviet ideology
The ideology of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) was Bolshevist Marxism–Leninism, an ideology of a centralised command economy with a vanguardist one-party state to realise the dictatorship of the proletariat. The Soviet Union' ...
. The academic was subsequently fired from his position.
He has also been pressured by the Soviet authorities for his publication of the Book of Dede Korkut. The Book, which is a collection of epic stories describing the lifestyle of the nomadic
Turkic peoples
The Turkic peoples are a collection of diverse ethnic groups of West, Central, East, and North Asia as well as parts of Europe, who speak Turkic languages.. "Turkic peoples, any of various peoples whose members speak languages belonging t ...
and their
pre-Islamic beliefs, was criticized by the
Soviet government
The Government of the Soviet Union ( rus, Прави́тельство СССР, p=prɐˈvʲitʲɪlʲstvə ɛs ɛs ɛs ˈɛr, r=Pravítelstvo SSSR, lang=no), formally the All-Union Government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, commonly ab ...
for allegedly promoting
bourgeois nationalism
In Marxism, bourgeois nationalism is the practice by the ruling classes of deliberately dividing people by nationality, race, ethnicity, or religion, so as to distract them from engaging in class struggle. It is seen as a divide-and-conquer stra ...
. Nevertheless, the publication of
dastan
Dastan ( fa, داستان ''dâstân'', meaning "story" or "tale") is an ornate form of oral history from Central Asia, Iran, Turkey and Azerbaijan.
A dastan is generally centered on one individual who protects his tribe or his people from ...
s did not wholly cease during that period.
Biography
Hamid Arasly was born on 23 February 1902 in
Ganja
Ganja (, ; ) is one of the oldest and most commonly used synonyms for marijuana. Its usage in English dates to before 1689.
Etymology
''Ganja'' is borrowed from Hindi/Urdu ( hi, गांजा, links=no, ur, , links=no, IPA: aːɲd ...
, to a priest father. His father was one of the clerical intellectuals of his time. He started his studies at the Ganja Teachers' Gymnasium in 1922. After graduating from there in 1926, he worked in a village school for 3 years where he gained experience as a teacher and principal.
In 1929, he was admitted to the Faculty of Linguistics and Literature at the
Azerbaijan State Pedagogic Institute. He graduated early in 1931 and went back to Ganja to assume the position of Deputy Chair of the Ganja Education Bureau. After a year, Hamid Arasly went to Baku to start his doctoral studies there, simultaneously working as the Director of Eastern Department of the new Library of the
National Academy of Sciences of the Azerbaijan SSR. There, he started collecting historically significant Eastern
manuscript
A manuscript (abbreviated MS for singular and MSS for plural) was, traditionally, any document written by hand – or, once practical typewriters became available, typewritten – as opposed to mechanically printed or reproduced in ...
s. In 1936, he officialized this pursuit of his, creating the Manuscripts Bureau within the National Academy of Sciences. That year, he became a member of the
Union of Azerbaijani Writers
The Union of Azerbaijani Writers ( az, Azərbaycan Yazıçılar Birliyi) is the largest public organization of Azerbaijani writers, poets and publicists. It has over 1500 members at present. It was founded on June 13, 1934, when Azerbaijan was a ...
. In 1938, it was revealed that some of the manuscripts he collected were against the
principles of Soviet ideology. Because of this, he was fired from the Manuscripts Bureau. He started to teach at
Azerbaijan State University in the same year.
In 1943, he defended his thesis, named "Azerbaijani literature in XVII - XVIII centuries", and earned the title
Candidate of Sciences
Candidate of Sciences (russian: кандидат наук, translit=kandidat nauk) is the first of two doctoral level scientific degrees in Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States. It is formally classified as UNESCO's ISCED level 8, "d ...
- roughly corresponding to a
western-style Ph.D. Starting in 1944, he worked as the Head of the Department of
Near Eastern Studies
Oriental studies is the academic field that studies Near Eastern and Far Eastern societies and cultures, languages, peoples, history and archaeology. In recent years, the subject has often been turned into the newer terms of Middle Eastern studie ...
at the National Academy of Sciences. In 1954, he received the title
Doctor of Sciences
Doctor of Sciences ( rus, доктор наук, p=ˈdoktər nɐˈuk, abbreviated д-р наук or д. н.; uk, доктор наук; bg, доктор на науките; be, доктар навук) is a higher doctoral degree in the Russi ...
and became a professor of literature and philology. Between 1960 and 1968, he was the chairman of the
Nizami Museum of Azerbaijani Literature
The National museum of Azerbaijan literature named after Nizami Ganjavi ( az, Nizami Gəncəvi adına Milli Azərbaycan ədəbiyyatı muzeyi) is a museum in Baku, established in 1939. It is located near the entrance of Icheri Sheher, not far fr ...
. Hamid Arasly was the recipient of numerous honorary titles, such as
Honored Scientist of Azerbaijan (1979) and
Uzbekistan
Uzbekistan (, ; uz, Ozbekiston, italic=yes / , ; russian: Узбекистан), officially the Republic of Uzbekistan ( uz, Ozbekiston Respublikasi, italic=yes / ; russian: Республика Узбекистан), is a doubly landlocked co ...
(1968). He became a full member of the National Academy of Sciences in 1968.
Scientific activity
Hamid Arasly was the author of research works on many of the great Azerbaijani poets and scholars such as
Imamaddin Nasimi,
Saib Tabrizi
Saib Tabrizi ( fa, صائب تبریزی, ''Ṣāʾib Tabrīzī'', , ''Mīrzā Muḥammad ʿalī Ṣāʾib''), was a Persian poet and one of the greatest masters of a form of classical Arabic and Persian lyric poetry characterized by rhymed coupl ...
,
Molla Panah Vagif
Molla Panah ( az, Molla Pənah), better known by his pen-name Vagif (), was an 18th-century Azerbaijani poet, statesman and diplomat. He is regarded as the founder of the realism genre in Azerbaijani poetry. He served as the vizier—the minist ...
,
Habibi and
Molla Vali Vidadi. He particularly made great contributions to the study of
Nizami and
Fuzûlî's heritage. For example, Arasly prepared a full collection of Fuzuli's poems - ''Fuẓūlī and his Works.''
He was also engaged in substantial research on
''Kitabi Dede Korkut'',
''Koroghlu'', and
Azerbaijani folklore
Azerbaijani folklore (Azerbaijani: Azərbaycan folkloru) is the folk tradition of Azerbaijani people which has developed throughout the centuries. Azerbaijani folklore is embodied explicitly in a large collection of narratives and implicitly in re ...
in general. For the first time, in 1939, Arasly published the
Book of Dede Korkut in the
Latin alphabet
The Latin alphabet or Roman alphabet is the collection of letters originally used by the ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered with the exception of extensions (such as diacritics), it used to write English and th ...
. He has also conducted a critical review of the
dastan
Dastan ( fa, داستان ''dâstân'', meaning "story" or "tale") is an ornate form of oral history from Central Asia, Iran, Turkey and Azerbaijan.
A dastan is generally centered on one individual who protects his tribe or his people from ...
, asserting that
Azerbaijani is the closest language to which is spoken in the book.
Hamid Arasly was one of the main authors of a two-volume “A Brief History of Azerbaijani Literature” (1943-1944) and three-volume “History of Azerbaijani Literature” (1957-1960). He authored some works focused on the relation between
Azerbaijani literature and
Persian
Persian may refer to:
* People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language
** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples
** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...
,
Turkish,
Uzbek, and
Turkmen literature.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Arasly, Hamid
1902 births
1983 deaths
20th-century philologists
Academics of Baku State University
Writers from Ganja, Azerbaijan
Recipients of the Order of the Red Banner of Labour
Azerbaijani literary critics
Azerbaijani philologists