Erkin Vohidov

Erkin Vohidov was born on 28 December 1936 in the Oltiariq district of the Fergana region, into a teacher’s family. His father fought in the Second World War and died soon after coming home; in 1945 the boy moved to Tashkent with his mother, Roziyaxon Vohidova, and before long lost her too. Orphaned at nine, he was raised in Tashkent by his maternal uncle Karimboy Sohiboyev, a lawyer by profession and a devoted lover of poetry. Poets and singers gathered at his house to discuss the couplets of Hafez, Navoi, Bedil and Fuzuli, and those evenings awakened the boy’s interest in literature.

He began writing poetry at school, and his first poem appeared in the magazine “Mushtum” when he was fourteen. From 1955 to 1960 he studied at the Faculty of Philology of Tashkent State University, now the National University of Uzbekistan. His first collection, “The Breath of Morning”, came out in 1961, followed by “My Songs Are for You” (1962), “The Heart and the Mind” (1963) and others. In the ghazals of “The Diwan of Youth” (1969) he carried the classical ghazal form into modern Uzbek poetry.

After university he spent many years in publishing: at the Yosh Gvardiya publishing house as an editor (1960–1963) and editor-in-chief (1975–1982), and at the Ghafur Ghulam Publishing House of Literature and Art as an editor and editor-in-chief (1963–1970) and later as its director (1985–1987). In 1982 he became the first editor-in-chief of the new magazine “Yoshlik”, which he led until 1985.

His ode “Oʻzbegim” (“My Uzbek People”), written in 1968, when every nationality was meant to call itself simply “the Soviet people”, celebrated the history and dignity of the Uzbeks; it became widely known and was turned into a song by Sherali Joʻrayev. His other works include the narrative poem “The Rebellion of the Spirits” (1980) about the Bengali poet Kazi Nazrul Islam, the collections “Living Planets” (1978) and “A Letter to the Future” (1983), and cycles of satirical verse. He wrote the comedy “The Golden Wall”, the drama “The Istanbul Tragedy” and the play “The Second Talisman”; “The Golden Wall” was also staged in Lahore, Pakistan. In 1983 he received the Hamza State Prize of the Uzbek SSR for the collection “The Eastern Shore”, and in 1987 he was named People’s Poet of the Uzbek SSR.

As a translator he rendered Goethe’s tragedy “Faust” into Uzbek in the 1970s and also translated poems by Sergei Yesenin, Alexander Blok, Alexander Tvardovsky, Muhammad Iqbal, Rasul Gamzatov and others. His own work has been translated into Russian, German, English, French, Urdu, Hindi, Arabic and Turkic languages, and the Russian poet Robert Rozhdestvensky spoke highly of his narrative poems.

From 1990 he held public office: in 1990–1995 he was a deputy of the Supreme Council of Uzbekistan and chaired its committee on glasnost (openness); in 1995–2005 he chaired the Oliy Majlis Committee on International Affairs and Inter-Parliamentary Relations; and in 2005–2009 he chaired the Senate Committee on Science, Education, Culture and Sport. He received the Soviet Order of the Badge of Honour (1984) and, after independence, the orders “Doʻstlik” (1994) and “Buyuk xizmatlari uchun” (1996); in 1999 he was made a Hero of Uzbekistan.

Erkin Vohidov died after a long illness in Tashkent on 30 May 2016, aged 79, and was buried in the Chigʻatoy cemetery. In December 2016 a presidential resolution ordered his 80th anniversary to be marked, and a park in Margilan was named after him; an Erkin Vohidov creative school opened in Margilan in 2018, and his memorial museum opened in the same park in 2019. His statue also stands in the Alley of Writers opened in Tashkent in 2020. In October of that year, for the 75th anniversary of the United Nations, a song in eight languages was recorded to his ode “Inson” (“Human”).