Naim Karimov

Naim Fatikhovich Karimov was born on 12 December 1932 in Tashkent into an intellectual family. In 1955 he graduated from the philology faculty of the Central Asian State University (now the National University of Uzbekistan) and then did postgraduate study, completing it in 1958.

From 1958 he worked at the Institute of Language and Literature of the Academy of Sciences of Uzbekistan (now the Alisher Navoi Institute of Uzbek Language, Literature and Folklore), as a junior researcher and later senior and leading researcher and head of a department, and was tied to the institute for almost half a century. He defended his candidate dissertation in 1962 and his doctoral dissertation in 1993, and became a professor in 1994.

His research is devoted to 20th-century Uzbek literature, above all jadid literature and the work of Hamza, Fitrat and Cho‘lpon. He studied literary phenomena in connection with historical events and the writer’s life. As a textual scholar he took part in preparing and publishing the collected works of Oybek (20 volumes), Ghafur Ghulam (12), Hamid Olimjon (10) and Hamza (5). He wrote the books “Hamid Olimjon” (1979), “Oybek” (1985), “Cho‘lpon” (1991), “Usmon Nosir” (1993) and “The Last Days of Usmon Nosir” (1994).

From 1999 he chaired the public commission for commemorating the victims of the colonial period. With his participation the Shahidlar Xotirasi memorial complex was built in Tashkent (2001) and the Museum of the Victims of Repression was founded (2002). In 2002–2008 he chaired the Shahidlar Xotirasi charitable foundation and directed the museum, and from 2008 he worked there as a leading researcher. In 1997 he joined the chief editorial board of the National Encyclopedia of Uzbekistan.

Karimov was a laureate of the Beruni State Prize of the Uzbek SSR (1985), Honoured Science Worker of Uzbekistan (1996) and holder of the Order “El-yurt hurmati”; in 2017 he was elected a full member (academician) of the Academy of Sciences of Uzbekistan. In 2022, on his 90th birthday, he was given the title Honoured Youth Mentor of Uzbekistan, and an international scientific conference was held in his honour.

Naim Karimov died in Tashkent on 17 September 2023. President Shavkat Mirziyoyev expressed condolences on his death.