Chustiy

Chustiy is the pen name of the poet whose real name was Nabikhon (Nabikhoja) Nurillakhoja ugli Khojaev. He was born on 20 February 1904 in the town of Chust in the Namangan region, into a craftsman's family, and took his pen name from his native town. His father was called Nurillakhoja.

He studied at old-style schools and madrasas in Chust and Kokand and began writing poetry at 18 or 20. In 1930–1939 he held responsible posts in collective farms and public organizations. When preparations began for the 500th anniversary of Alisher Navoi, he was called to Tashkent: in 1939–1941 he was a literary staff member of the Muqimi musical theatre and in 1941–1942 its director. In 1942–1944 he directed the literary fund of the Writers' Union of Uzbekistan, then worked as a translator for publishers, and in 1959–1968 as a research fellow at the Institute of Language and Literature of the Academy of Sciences of Uzbekistan.

Over his life Chustiy published some twenty collections of poems. He worked mainly in the classical tradition, writing ghazals, muhammas, musaddas, murabba, rubai, tuyuq and masnavi, and composing takhmis on ghazals by Navoi, Fuzuli, Nodira and Furqat. The war years were especially productive; the collections “Qo'zg'ol”, “Shamshir” and “Lolazor” and the dastan “Zafarnoma” are devoted to the homeland and heroism. His collections “Gul mavsumi”, “G'azallar” and “Hayot zavqi” and the dastans “Kiyiknoma” and “Bog'i Eram” also appeared.

He was known as a poet of song too: dozens of his ghazals were recorded on gramophone records as early as the 1930s, and his ghazals and muhammas on love and morals are sung by many performers. As a playwright he took part in the stage works “Davron ota” (with Kamil Yashen and Sabir Abdulla), “Qo'chqor Turdiyev” (with Sabir Abdulla), “Qasos” (with Abdulla Umariy and Tuyg'un) and “Qurbon Umarov”.

As a translator, Chustiy rendered works by Saadi, Hafez, Amir Khusrau Dehlavi, Sabir Termizi and other Persian and Tajik poets into Uzbek; he also took part in compiling the four-volume explanatory dictionary of the language of Alisher Navoi's works.

The poet died on 13 August 1983. After his death the books “Yod eting kamtarin Chustiyni ham” (1984), “Hayotnoma” (1988), “Sadoqat gullari” (1992), “Ko'ngil tilagi” (1994) and “Ko'rguncha xayr endi” (2004) were published. Streets, schools, libraries, cinemas and collective farms in Tashkent, Chust, Kokand and Namangan bear his name, and the centenary of his birth was marked in 2004.