Saken Seifullin: photo, biography of Saken Seifullin in Russian

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

Kazakh writer Saken Seifullin is considered the founder of modern national literature of his country. He was a prominent figure in the Bolshevik Party and held important government positions in his native republic.

Origin

Saken Seifullin's date of birth is October 15, 1894. The child was born in a nomadic village on the territory of the then Akmola district. Today this territory belongs to the Karaganda region of the Republic of Kazakhstan. His real birth name was Sadvakas. The writer began to call himself Saken due to the fact that this affectionate and simplified address at his home was used much more often and more willingly.

The boy was born into a family with little income. His father was a musician and played the dombra, the national instrument of the Kazakhs and Nogais. He loved hunting and was engaged in breeding hunting bird species. Saken's mother knew all the local folklore by heart and was a skilled storyteller. From early childhood, Saken Seifullin was surrounded by epics and epic poems, which were passed from mouth to mouth in his native village. Of course, this instilled in the boy an interest in literature, which infuture determined his fate - the fate of the famous national writer.

Childhood

At the age of 11, Saken Seifullin was sent to the nearest school, which was located at the Uspensky mine. The father wanted his son to master Russian literacy. There the boy spent three years. Later, the writer recalled that his childhood impressions of the pictures of the harsh working conditions of the miners were forever imprinted in his memory.

Saken continued his studies first in Akmolinsk and then in Omsk. The local seminary, not without reason, was called the Siberian University. It was a regional center of education and science. Higher education institutions in that turbulent era were always places where bold political ideas took root.

Beginning revolutionary and poet

Saken Seifullin could not but be influenced by the advanced influence. The biography of the young man in 1914 was marked by two important events. Firstly, the aspiring poet joined the revolutionary organization "Unity", consisting of Kazakh nationalists, and secondly, at the same time his first collection of poems "Past Days" was published.

In the political arena, Saken made progress. He spoke a lot at secret meetings of revolutionaries and honed his art of rhetoric. Then the young man came under the supervision of the tsarist secret police. In "Past Days" the poet spoke bitterly about the fate of his people. Saken did not like the impoverished state of the majority of Kazakhs and the dominance of outdated patriarchal customs in villages.

Witness of revolutions

In 1916The Omsk Seminary said goodbye to the next generation of graduates, among whom was Saken Seifullin. A brief biography of the writer of that time is a typical example of a man of his education and position. He spent the first year of his adult life at school.

After that, Saken moved to Akmolinsk. At the same time, two revolutions took place in Russia. With the coming to power of the Bolsheviks, the writer supported the new order. He took an active part in the organization and creation of a new Council of Workers' and Peasants' Deputies of the city of Akmolinsk. In May 1918, the local Bolsheviks were overthrown by the Whites. Seifullin was captured. Kolchak's supporters decided to transfer him to Omsk.

Caught by whites

The Red prisoners were transported through Siberia in the so-called death wagons. Saken Seifullin also visited them. Photos of these terrible trains heading to concentration camps can now be found in museum exhibits and history books. Half-dead prisoners rode in the wagons blown by the icy wind. Periodically they were tortured by whites. The civil war, of course, led to the bitterness and bestiality of the participants on both sides of the conflict.

The writer shared his bitter memories of those terrible days in one of his most famous books, The Thorny Path. Seifullin, like other prisoners, received a bread ration only once every three days. Many also began to become dehydrated, to which the guards did not react in any way. The poet managed to escape from the "death wagon" only thanks to a bold and even recklessrun.

Illuminator

In 1920 the writer returned to Akmolinsk. This city, like the one where Saken Seifullin was born, finally came under the rule of the Bolsheviks. Having restored his documents and physically strengthened, the young intellectual took a lively part in the construction of a new socialist country. In 1922 he was elected Deputy People's Commissar of Education of the Kazakh Republic. But this position was only the beginning of his meteoric public career.

While educating the population of his native country, Seifullin realized with particular acuteness its cultural decline. The writer again took up the study of the national language. He began to write articles and publish in local newspapers. At the same time, the Bolsheviks at their XII Congress decided that it was necessary to spread the Russian language in the rest of the republics of the USSR.

Saken Seifullin could not come to terms with this state of affairs. He used a variety of levers. Firstly, the writer published several categorical articles in which he publicly advocated that all stationery in Kazakhstan should be kept in the national language, in defiance of the Bolshevik decision in Moscow. Secondly, Seifullin, already known throughout the country, put pressure on the CEC with the help of his administrative resource. Thanks to this, on November 22, 1923, a historic decision was made. The Central Election Commission issued a decree, which fixed the rule: Kazakh state papers were now to be kept in the national language, and not in Russian.

Creative zenith

In the late 1920s and 1930s, Seifullin was torn between his many activities and writing concerns. He was the rector at several Kazakh universities at once. The poet combined these positions with the chair of the editor-in-chief of the Literary Front magazine. Seifullin was also directly behind the creation of the Union of Writers of Kazakhstan.

Simultaneously with his administrative and journalistic duties, the poet did not forget about the most important thing - creativity. He published several more collections, and also began writing large-format prose. In the early 30s, the novels The Thorny Path and Our Life were published, which was written in the genre of bright and witty satire. Seifullin has been exceptionally active and active for many years. Therefore, it is not surprising that many years later, compatriots began to call him the father of Kazakh Soviet literature.

Arrest and death

The biography of Saken Seifullin (in Russian there is also a description of the life path of this person) says that at the end of 1936 he, as a well-known public figure and writer, was invited to Moscow to events dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the death of Alexander Pushkin. At the same time, the Kazakh poet was the first among his compatriots to receive the Order of the Red Banner of Labor. It seemed that Seifullin was experiencing his creative and social triumph.

However, already in 1937 he was arrested in Alma-Ata. The writer, like many other high-ranking Bolsheviks of the "first draft", wasinto the millstones of repression unleashed by Stalin. Saken Seifullin was recognized as an "enemy of the people." Confessions were beaten out of him by torture. On April 25, 1938, he was shot in one of the Alma-Ata prisons of the NKVD. The writer was rehabilitated in 1957, posthumously. Today he is one of the main national heroes and symbols of modern independent Kazakhstan.