Shokir Sulaymon

Shokir Sulaymon (born Shokir Sulaymonov) was born in 1900 in Kokand, on the eve of Navruz. His father Sobirkhoja was an educated man and the boy’s first teacher; Shokir then studied at the Irfon school of the Kokand Jadid Abduvahob Ibodiy and later at a Russian-native school.

In 1916–1917 he went to the Husayniya madrasa in Orenburg, where he came to know Jadid ideas at first hand. He studied at the Uzbek regional education institute in Tashkent (1920–1922), at a workers’ faculty in Moscow (1922–1924) and then at the Krupskaya Higher Pedagogical Academy (until 1926). In Moscow he took part in a literary circle of Turkestani students and wrote letters and articles for the press. He began writing poetry in 1919.

In 1926 he returned to Samarkand, then the republic’s capital, and taught Uzbek at a party school. He helped found the Qizil Qalam literary society (1926–1930) and later the Writers’ Union of Uzbekistan and its Samarkand branch. From 1927 to 1930 he was executive secretary of the journals Maorif va o‘qituvchi and Yer yuzi, and from 1931 to 1937 an assistant and then docent at the Uzbek State University.

He wrote the poetry collections “Erk kuylari” (1926), “G‘alaba marshi” (1928) and “Davr hayqirig‘i” (1932), and the long poems “Yangi saroy” (1931) and “O‘tganlarni eslaganda” (1933). With poems such as “Qul”, “Qutulish alangasi”, “Qonli devor” and “Sharq qizi” he helped establish free verse in Uzbek poetry. He also wrote short stories, books for children (“Oq negr”, “Yama ham Hama”, “Hindistonda”, “Butun dunyoga sayohat”) and translated children’s books from Russian. A volume of his selected works appeared in 1934 for the first congress of Uzbek writers.

He also took an interest in oral folk literature: in 1923 he published the articles “Xalq adabiyoti” and “Milliy kuy va ashulalarimiz” in the newspaper Farg‘ona, urging that folklore be collected. In 1938 he was an editor at the State Publishing House of Uzbekistan, and in 1940–1941 a senior researcher at the Institute of Language and Literature.

On 27 August 1941 he was arrested on charges of belonging to the organizations Ittihodi Tolibon and Milliy Ittihod, branded counter-revolutionary, and of nationalism; he was shot in 1942 (sources give different dates). He was rehabilitated in September 1956, and in 1964 his stories were published as the collection “O‘ch”.