Muhammadsharif Sufizoda

Muhammadsharif Egamberdi ogli Sufizoda was born on 29 January 1880 in Chust, into a craftsman’s family; his father made knives. His birth year was long given as 1869, but 1880 is the year in the poet’s own autobiography and personal file and in the National Encyclopedia of Uzbekistan. He learned to read from a neighbour, Manzura otin, and then attended an old-style school; he read Hafiz, Bedil, Navoi, Muqimi and Furqat and began writing poetry himself.

In the 1890s he lived in Kokand, studied at a madrasa and drew close to the poets around Muqimi. On Muqimi’s advice he took the pen name “Vahshiy” and wrote satirical verse exposing wealthy men and officials. He returned to Chust in 1899; two years later he was accused of godlessness and sentenced to death, and had to leave his homeland.

From 1900 to 1913 he travelled to Tiflis, Baku, Arabia, India and Turkey, met Azerbaijani enlighteners in Baku, and published poems in the press of Turkestan, the Caucasus and Orenburg. In 1910–1913 he taught in Kungrad. In 1913 he came back to Chust and opened a new-method school; in the village of Kamarsada he founded “Dorulaytom”, an orphanage school, and an evening school for adults, teaching the mother tongue and geometry. His poem “Chustilar bizlar”, published in 1914, again brought persecution. He also opened a Jadid school in the village of Shahand near Turakurgan; the village’s School No. 33 is now named after him.

From 1915 he taught in India and Afghanistan. His poems in the Kabul newspaper “Siraj al-Akhbar” drew the attention of Emir Habibullah, who allowed him to open a school; under Emir Amanullah he worked in the Ministry of Education. In 1918–1919 he came to Turkestan as an interpreter for the Afghan mission and stayed in his homeland.

Under Soviet rule he went on writing and teaching; his satirical poems appeared in “Qizil O‘zbekiston”, “Mushtum” and “Farg‘ona”. On 13 August 1925 the newspaper “Farg‘ona” published his cycle “Xushchaqchaq qalamlar” (“Merry Pencils”), and in 1934 he wrote the dastan “Bayram nashidalari”. On 27 February 1926, by a decree of the Uzbek SSR government, he and Hamza Hakimzoda Niyoziy were named People’s Poet of the Uzbek SSR. His 55th birthday was marked on 29 January 1935, when more than 200 of his poems were gathered for publication.

In 1937 Sufizoda was declared an “enemy of the people”, arrested and shot in Tashkent the same year, aged 57. His burial place is unknown, and the collection of poems prepared for print never appeared.

His only collection of verse, “Tarona”, came out in 1968, and a volume of “Selected Works” (with Ibrat and Ajziy) in 1999. A museum in Chust is devoted to him, and the children’s library of Namangan Region bears his name.