Nikolay Ilyin

Nikolay Dmitrievich Ilyin was born on 27 November 1950 in Zlatoust, in Russia's Chelyabinsk Region. His family moved to Tashkent, where he finished secondary school and graduated from the philology faculty of Tashkent State University.

Ilyin is a philologist and teacher by profession. In 1975–1997 he taught Russian literature at the Republican Institute of Russian Language and Literature in Tashkent and at the Uzbek State University of World Languages. A candidate of pedagogical sciences and associate professor, he is the author of more than 60 scholarly works on literary history and theory and on teaching methods. He was a section editor of the scholarly and methodological journal “Teaching of Language and Literature” and worked as deputy editor-in-chief of the magazine “Zvezda Vostoka”.

His poems have appeared in the almanacs “Pod znakom oseni” and “Malyy shyolkovyy put” (Tashkent), “Kronos” (Daugavpils, Latvia) and “I pomnit mir spasyonnyy…” (Moscow), and in the Moscow journal “Druzhba narodov”. His poetry collections have been published since 2004: “Pervaya tetrad” (2004), “Po klavisham dushi” (2005), “Na kochevyakh vremyon” (2006), “Obetovannaya pamyat” (2008), “Po stopam listopada” (2010), “Listva i korni” (2015), “Esli okno otkryto…” (2017) and “Arkhivarius oseni” (2020).

Translating and studying Uzbek literature holds a special place in his work. Ilyin has translated into Russian poems by Navoi, Babur, Pahlavan Mahmud, Abdulla Oripov, Erkin Vohidov, Sirojiddin Sayyid, Cho'lpon, Mirtemir, Guzal Begim, Khosiyat Rustamova and other poets. In 2020 he compiled and translated Abdulhamid Cho'lpon's collection “Mgnoveniya lyubvi” (Moments of Love). In 2022 the Writers' Union of Uzbekistan published his book “Peresekayushchiyesya parallelli” (Intersecting Parallels), on translation theory, Uzbek literature and the Russian-language literature of Uzbekistan, with the publisher Adabiyot.

In 2011 Ilyin was a laureate of the literary competition “Vatan uchun yashaylik”, held for the 20th anniversary of Uzbekistan's independence. He is a member of the Writers' Union of Uzbekistan and a holder of the Order of Friendship (Do'stlik).