Mahmud Toir

Mahmud Toir (real name Mahmudjon Toirov) was born on 31 August 1952 in the village of Parkent in the Parkent district of the Tashkent region. From 1959 to 1969 he attended the school named after Nizami. His first poem, “Tannoz kelur” (“The coquette comes”), was printed in a district newspaper while he was in the seventh grade.

In 1969 he entered the evening division of the philology faculty of Tashkent State University (now the National University of Uzbekistan) and worked as a carpenter for a construction organisation on the student campus. He served in the army in 1971–1973 and then resumed his studies. During these years he worked as a proofreader and head of the proofreading department at the Yosh Gvardiya publishing house.

After graduating in 1977 he joined the children’s and youth broadcasting department of Republic Radio. In 1984 he was appointed editor of the newspaper Parkent tongi. From June 1999 he was executive secretary of the Tashkent regional branch of the Writers’ Union of Uzbekistan, and by 2020 he headed that branch.

The poet’s first collection, “Ayt endi, yuragim” (“Say it now, my heart”), came out in 1991 from the Ghafur Ghulam Publishing House of Literature and Art. It was followed by “Biz nechun uchrashdik” (“Why did we meet”, 1992), “Muhabbat shevasi” (“The dialect of love”, 1995), “Oqib ketgan armonlar” (“Dreams swept away”, 1996), “Barmoqlar bodasi” (1998), “Haqni tanib” (“Having recognised the truth”, 1999) and “Yuz to‘rtlik” (“One hundred quatrains”, 2002), as well as a volume of selected poems, “Saylanma” (2002). Many of his poems are performed as songs by well-known singers of the republic.

In 2001 Mahmud Toir received the Order “Mehnat shuhrati” (Labour Glory), and in 2005 the title People’s Poet of Uzbekistan. In January 2020 he was elected a member of the Senate from the Tashkent region, and in 2024 he was still speaking as a senator.