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From Bukhara to Dushanbe: Outlining the Evolution of Soviet Tajik Fiction

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

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Abstract

This article offers an overview of Soviet Tajik Fiction under Stalinism (1920s–1950s) and during de-Stalinization (1950s–1970s) by contemplating the move from Bukhara to Dushanbe as a setting for Tajik stories and novels. In particular, it details the two main literary genres of the period, namely historical and psychological fiction. It argues that when tracing the main stages of evolution of Soviet Tajik fiction from the point of view of the setting one should mainly consider the works by Sadriddin Ayni, Jalol Ikromi and Fazliddin Muhammadiev.

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Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 50 , Issue 5 , September 2017 , pp. 691 - 704
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 2017

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Footnotes

She obtained her Ph.D. in Central Asian Studies from the Università di Napoli “L'Orientale,” Italy, in 2012. Her research focuses on the social history and cultural bilingualism in Central Asia (Iranian-Turkic languages) from the sixteenth century to the present, and on modern Tajik literature. I would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their suggestions and comments. All errors remain mine.

In this article, I have transliterated all terms according to Tajik Cyrillic orthography, since most of the Tajik literary works of the Soviet period were published in that script. Words followed by the izofat (ezafeh) are conventionally written as single words in the Tajik Cyrillic script (e.g. adabiyoti sovetii tojik “Soviet Tajik literature”), but in this article they are shown by hyphenation (adabiyot-i soveti-yi tojik).

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