Turab Tula

Turab Tula (real surname Tulakhozhaev) was born on 24 December 1918 into a peasant family in the village of Turbat, then in Chimkent province and now in southern Kazakhstan. He studied in Tashkent, first at the theatre technical school (1934–1938) and then in the evening department of the language and literature faculty of the pedagogical institute (1938–1941). He began writing poetry at fifteen or sixteen, and his first collection, “Sheʼrlar” (“Poems”), appeared in 1939.

He started work in 1935 as a literary staff member of the newspaper “Yosh leninchi” and as an editor and announcer at the Uzbek State Radio Committee, where he stayed until 1948. He later served as literary secretary of “Qizil Oʻzbekiston”, as an instructor in party bodies and as an editor at the State Publishing House. In 1947, together with Temur Fattoh, he wrote the words of the anthem of the Uzbek SSR, set to music by Mutal Burhonov.

From the late 1950s he held senior posts in film and theatre: head of the script department of the Uzbekfilm studio (1957–1962), secretary of the Cinematographers’ Union (1962–1967), head of the Arts Department under the Ministry of Culture (1967–1976) and director of the Hamza Theatre (1977–1979). He wrote the script of the film “Maftuningman” (“Enchanted by You”, 1958) and, with M. Melkumov, of “Furqat” (1960); his poems such as “Doʻppi tikdim” became songs.

His poetry collections include “Shodligim” (1941), “Tabassum” (“Smile”, 1944), “Baxt tongotari” (“Dawn of Happiness”, 1948), “Oromijon” (1961), “Gulyor” (1968) and “Oftob nayzada” (“The Sun at Noon”, 1974); his narrative poems include “Hamiyat” (1948), “Zamon hukmi” (1968), “Suyuk momo” (1975) and “Tramvayda topilgan daftar” (“A Notebook Found on a Tram”, 1978). As a playwright he wrote “Qizbuloq” (1968) and “Nodirabegim” (first called “Quvvai qahqaha”, 1969) and the musical drama “Momo yer” after a novella by Chingiz Aitmatov, and he wrote opera and ballet libretti; he translated Schiller, Shakespeare, Pushkin, Lermontov and Nekrasov into Uzbek.

He was named Honoured Art Worker of the Uzbek SSR in 1967, received the Order of the Badge of Honour (1959) and the Order of the Red Banner of Labour (1978), and was given the title People’s Poet of the Uzbek SSR in 1988. From 1980 until his death he led the Tashkent regional branch of the Writers’ Union and the Centre for the Promotion of Literature.

Turab Tula died in Tashkent in 1990 and was buried at the Chigatai cemetery. A street in Tashkent once bore his name. His children are the art historian Mukhabbat Tulakhozhaeva and the film director and actor Nazim Tulakhozhaev.