Miftahetdin Akmulla: biography and poems of the poet

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

Akmulla Miftakhetdin shigyrzary is a famous poet-educator, thinker and philosopher of the Bashkir people, who left a deep mark not only in national literature, but also in the educational and cultural life of neighboring peoples - Kazakhs and Tatars. In addition, his work is respected and popular among other representatives of the Turkic nationality, such as the Turkmen.

What is the biography of this outstanding, talented person? What is remarkable about his life and literary work? Let's find out.

A little-known childhood

The biography of Miftakhetdin Akmulla originates in the small village of Tuksanbaevo, located on the banks of the Dema River in the Republic of Bashkortostan (formerly the Orenburg province). The poet was born back in 1831, in the month of December.

The origin of Akmullah's parents is still unknown. There are several versions of his ancestry. According to one, the poet's parents were Bashkirs-patrimonials, his father even served as an imam. From other sources it follows that the parent of Miftakhetdin was a Kazakh. There is another version of the birth of a writer, according towhose mother was from Kazan.

Many sources of information say that the poet lived with his parents for a long time. By the way, Akmulla's father had two wives, and the family did not live in a separate house, but together with other brothers and their families. They lived crowded, poor, miserable.

You can learn more about this and other unknown facts from the biography of Miftakhetdin Akmulla (in Bashkir) by visiting the museum opened in honor of the poet in his small homeland.

Youth and youth

Akmulla Miftakhetdin studied well (in the Bashkir language his real name sounds like Kamaletdinov Miftakhetdin Kamaletdin uly) well, from an early age he had a craving for science and knowledge, especially literature, writing and history. He received his primary education in his native village, then studied at a madrasah, a generally accepted educational institution among Muslims, which serves as a secondary school and a theological seminary.

In the village of Sterlibashevo, Akmulla Miftakhetdin was fortunate enough to study with Shamsetdin Yarmukhametovich Zaki himself, the famous Bashkir poet who adheres to Sufism (a kind of esoteric trend in Islam) and preaches asceticism and increased spirituality.

Perhaps it was then, having come into such close contact with someone else's poetic work, Akmulla wanted to write poems on his own in order to convey his emotions with their help and share his conclusions and views with others.

Seeking the Truth

The further fate of the poet Akmulla Miftakhetdin also looks fit andlittle known. It is known for certain that the man traveled a lot in southern Bashkortostan, then visited the Trans-Urals - the western part of Eastern Siberia. He visited local villages and auls of Kazakhstan, led a nomadic life, engaged in educational activities and promoting humanistic ideas. This will be discussed below.

How did Akmulla Miftakhetdin earn his living? Poems of the poet did not bring him sufficient income. Traveling from village to village, he was engaged in crafts, for example, he worked in carpentry, or he taught children to read, write, and simple sciences. Working tools, as well as books and some of his manuscripts, the man always carried with him in special sections of his cart.

Wanderer writer

However, the most important occupation of Akmulla Miftakhetdin was poetry. He was very fond of the people, poor and disadvantaged people, and tried to make life easier for them with the help of his bright, original creativity. The main theme of the poet's lyrics was the life of these unfortunate creatures. He urged them to stand up against social prejudices, against beys and landowners who grew rich on the needs and misfortunes of the common people.

Akmulla Miftakhetdin rarely wrote down his compositions on sheets of paper. He considered his works to be the property of the people, therefore he kept them deep in his memory. The writer went down in history as a talented poet-improviser. He could compose deep, touching poems as he walked, reciting them beautifully to the assembled people.

Passing by various villages and auls, Akmulla not only recited his lyrical creations, but also competed in wisdom and eloquence with famous folk storytellers (sesens), who, to the accompaniment of the dumbyrs, sang Bashkir songs, takmaks, baits, kubars in recitative.

Detractors

The more the popularity of young Miftahetdin grew and the army of admirers and followers increased, the more significant and noble his enemies and opponents became.

Among the most important, the Kazakh bai Batuch Isyangildin was especially distinguished, who wrote a denunciation of the famous wanderer poet, allegedly he evades the royal military service, posing as the son of a Kazakh. In fact, it was so. Akmulla could not imagine himself in the ranks or leading a sedentary, subordinate lifestyle. A rebel by nature, he was a rebel in spirit who wanted to change people's lives for the better, to achieve any reforms and corrections.

Influential officials, fearing the influence of the poet and his work on the common people, took advantage of a hypocritical denunciation and put the poet in prison, where he spent four long years.

Life in prison was hard and unbearable. Oppressive for Miftakhetdin were not only prison humiliations and hardships, but also loneliness, isolation, forced seclusion. As an active and purposeful, creative and emotional person, Akmulla could not put up with inaction and isolation, he found an outlet in creativity.

It was in prison that the man composed a lot. He wrote about freedom andhappiness, about the fight against oppressors and about a happy future. He described the taunts and mockery of the jailers, the difficult unbearable conditions and his love for independence and for his native land.

The poet's faithful admirer Gabibul Zigangirov saved him from a long prison term, who turned to Alexander II with a written request for the poet and paid a deposit equal to two thousand rubles for him.

After release

Having gained the long-awaited freedom, Akmulla Miftakhetdin went to his native village. He was forty years old, he had already been married twice and wanted to find rest in his homeland. However, the father, this backward and conserved person, could not understand the freedom-loving progressive son. After frequent quarrels and misunderstandings, father and son were forced to separate.

Akmulla went to travel and educate people.

He again and again instilled in his compatriots a sense of dignity, awareness of personal independence and the ability to stand up for themselves. He planted in the minds of ordinary and downtrodden people the desire for enlightenment, the desire for knowledge and broadening their horizons.

How was this reflected in the poet's work?

Bashkirs, we all need enlightenment

This poem is also called "My Bashkirs!". Despite the fact that the work is written in Tatar, each of its lines breathes love and tenderness not only for the native people, but also for the native language, for the native land.

The main idea of the poem is a call for enlightenment and knowledge that will be useful inlife and work of ordinary people. The poem is rich in comparisons and hyperbole, it breathes with passion, confidence and kindness.

My place is in the zindan

This work is filled with oppressive longing, which the poet experienced while in a four-year imprisonment. But, despite the fact that he is all turned yellow and thinner (according to the author), nevertheless he directs all thoughts to his oppressed compatriots, whom he greatly worries and cares about in his forced imprisonment.

Works about the surrounding world

These poems (for example, "Fire" and "Water"), vividly describing the elements of nature, truthfully and philosophically honestly show the frailty of life, the short duration of human life and human dreams. No matter how rich and noble a person is, "everything in the world is subject to fire." Only knowledge and wisdom are eternal.

Akmulla Miftakhetdin's work "Autumn" sounds sensually tender and psychologically complex (the translation of the poem into Russian is quite common, but does not convey even a share of those rushing feelings and unsaid emotions).

Describing the world of nature, the poet does not paint a picture of peace and tranquility, but a storm of sensations and changes, active movement, a variety of colors, sounds, impressions.

Struggle against class inequality

This has become one of the main goals of Akmulla's creativity. In the poems "Our World" and "By Curse and Prayer" the poet exposes rich cruel people whose desires and feelings are focused only on profit and on the enslavement of their own kind.

Miftahetdin believed that he would prosper for the time beingclass inequality, life in native Bashkiria will not improve, and poor people will remain persecuted and unhappy.

Death of a poet

Of course, such bold and progressive views could not go unnoticed by rich people. Akmulla Miftakhetdin was secretly hated by many beys and cult figures, as he called on the people not only to rise up against the fat rich, but also to get rid of religious backwardness, fanaticism and superstition.

According to some sources, the death of the poet was ordered - he was killed on the night of the twenty-sixth to twenty-seventh of October 1895 (according to the new style) by order of Bai Isyangildin. The body was found in a river near a railway station in the southern Urals.

Memory of the poet-thinker

A street in the city of Almetievsk was named in honor of the great Bashkir writer, as well as the Bashkir Pedagogical University.

The monument to Miftakhetdin Akmulla was opened on October 8, 2008, on the anniversary of the death of the great Bashkir poet, in the city of Ufa, opposite the square, also named after the freedom-loving philosopher.

The statue depicts a tired traveler-educator surrounded by two children, attentively listening to his instructions.

This composition clearly and accurately describes the creative activity of the Bashkir thinker.