(MENAFN- AzerNews)
By Vugar Khalilov
The XIX century was marked by significant social and political
transformation as a result of new discoveries, original ideas, and
the enlightenment movement, which fought against bigotry and
conventional wisdom in Azerbaijan.
Following the Gulustan (1813) and Turkmanchay (1828) treaties
between Russia and Persia northern Azerbaijan (including the
modern-day Azerbaijan Republic) was annexed by the Russian empire.
The Occupation overthrew the previous khanates in the north and
installed Moscow as the new power center. In many respects, the
separation was tragic for the people and caused great social
turmoil, but it also provided access to Russian, European, and
Western cultures and ideas.
Growing up under this socio-political transformation, writer and
public figure Mirza Fatali Akhundov saw an opportunity to usher in
a new literary period by bringing western culture and ideas into
Azerbaijani literature and public life. He was the Enlightenment
movement's founding father and a pivotal figure in Azerbaijan.
The outstanding Azerbaijani intellectuals were aware of the
social, political, economic, and cultural issues facing the country
and made a concerted effort to address them.
Early life
Mirza Fatali Akhundov was born in Nukha, now Shaki, in
northwestern Azerbaijan in 1812. His father was from the Iranian
Azerbaijani village of Hamana, which is close to Tabriz, while his
mother was from Shaki.
Early in 1832, before departing on a visit to Mecca, Akhund Haji
Alasgar, Fatali's maternal granduncle, brought him to Ganja to
study in a religious school (madrasa) associated with the Shah
Abbas Mosque. Akhundov received training in calligraphy, as well as
lectures in logic and religion from renowned Azerbaijani poet Mirza
Shafi Vazeh. The two intellectuals rapidly developed a close
bond.
In an effort to steer the 20-year-old Akhundov away from
religious studies, Mirza Shafi urged him to focus on modern
sciences. Fatali put up his religious and clerical studies under
Mirza Shafi's influence and started studying Russian to understand
about Russian and European cultures.
Fatali hoped to work in the public service and pursue his study
among Russian intellectuals in Tiflis (now Tbilisi), the South
Caucasus' administrative and cultural center at the time. Haji
Alasgar did all in his ability to assist his adoptive son rather
than attempting to discourage him. He accompanied Fatali to Tiflis
in the fall of 1834, when Akhundov was offered a position in the
government.
The Russian royal dynasty cherished Tiflis at the time since it
was a bustling, prosperous city. Some of the finest writers from
Azerbaijan, like Abbasgulu Aga Bakikhanov, Ismayil Qutqashinli, and
Qasim Bay Zakir, were among those Mirza Fatali met and got to know
in that environment.
He also kept in touch with poet Mirza Shafi Vazeh. Giorgi
Eristavi, the creator of Georgian theater, Alexander Bestuzhev
(Marlinsky), an exiled Decembrist writer from Russia, Tadeusz Lada
Zablocki, a Polish revolutionary, Yakov Polonsky, a Russian poet,
Nikolay Khanikov, and Adolf Berzhe, two Russian orientalists, were
also among Akhundov's pals. These connections had a significant
impact on Akhundov's views, as well as his literary and scientific
activities.
Literary and public activities
Akhundov is regarded as Azerbaijan's first realist dramatist,
novelist, and literary critic. With the publication of a poem on
the death of Aleksandr Pushkin in 1837, he was the first author to
employ a western form in eastern poetry. Later, beginning in 1850,
he wrote Western-style comedies.
For more than 40 years, Akhundov's literary and political
contributions fostered the spiritual growth of the Azerbaijani
people. He became well-known as the leading enlightenment movement
theorist and a significant public activist, not just in Azerbaijan
but throughout the whole East.
Akhundov employed the Russian scientific and cultural milieu as
a conduit in order to infuse Azerbaijani writing with the
democratic spirit of western spirituality and culture. Akhundov
read both Russian and European great authors such as Griboyedov,
Pushkin, Gogol, Shakespeare, Molière, Voltaire, and
Montesquieu.
He was almost the first reformer of the Muslim world, according
to literary historian Firidun Bay Kocharli, who also praised
Akhundov's efforts as a writer and social reformer. He was the
first to dismantle the outdated, corrupt underpinnings of Muslim
life and to fight tooth and nail to alter the norms that hindered
Islam's advancement, Khocharly said.
The six comedies - The Tale of Mollah Ibrahimkhalil the
Alchemist (1850), The Tale of Monsieur Jordan the Botanist and the
Celebrated Sorcerer, Darvish Mastali Shah (1850), The Tale of the
Bear that Caught the Bandit (1851), The Adventures of the Vizier of
the Khan of Lankaran (1851), and the Adventures of the Mean (1855)
- Akhundov wrote were the first realist plays in Azerbaijan and the
Near East to be written in the European style. Azerbaijani
literature underwent a real revolution as a result of Akhundov's
five-year span of writing.
Akhundov established the groundwork for dramaturgy not only in
Azerbaijani literature but also in the Turkish-Muslim world from
the Balkans to India by writing his six great plays between 1850
and 1855. With his comedies, the great master provided a model for
writing plays in the Eastern world. It is a well-known fact that
dramaturgy in the Turkish-Muslim world developed in the light of
Akhundov's dramaturgy traditions.
The enduring comedies of Akhundov served as the foundation for
Azerbaijani theater. In 1873, Hasan Bay Zardabi together with Najaf
Bay Vazirov staged the famous play 'Haji Kara' in one of Baku's
schools and laid the foundation of the theater movement in
Azerbaijan and in the Turkish-Muslim world in general.
In Akhundov's comedies, stage characters of Eastern women were
created for the first time in the image of Azerbaijani women. In
the 19th century, showing an Azerbaijani woman laughing and talking
together with men on the theater stage required courage. Despite
the constraints of the period, Azerbaijani intellectuals managed to
realize this great work by bringing Akhundov's plays to the
stage.
The comedies took inspiration from then Azerbaijani realities.
The people were all local in terms of personality types, modes of
thought, dress, and dialect. The local and vibrant dialects of the
area had an impact on the linguistic design of comedies as
well.
In his plays, Akhundov made effective use of his expertise in
both European and Russian theater. A lot of the characters and
topics in Akhundov's comedies have similarities to those in
characters from Molière and Gogol.
Comedy was one of the most effective genres for fighting the
harsh realities and drawbacks of social life that caused disaster
in society. Comedy was a great tool to lampoon these realities and
encourage viewers to do the same while also fighting back against
them. By using comedy as a corrective force in his own critical
way, Akhundov exposed the severe defects in society.
In addition to plays and a novella, Mirza Fatali Akhundov also
authored articles and other works with social, ethical, economic,
and philosophical content.
Alphabet reform
By utilizing Russia and Western Europe as precedents, Mirza
Fatali Akhundov sought to promote local culture. He believed that
mass education was essential to achieving it. He believed that such
a significant task first required modifications to the Arabic
script, which at the time was used to write Azerbaijani and
Persian.
He created a new alphabet in 1857 using the Arabic alphabet as a
model. The new alphabet was simpler to learn and better captured
the sounds of the Azerbaijani language. He started a campaign for
alphabet reform by sending the alphabet to linguists, orientalists,
and the leaders of Iran and the Ottoman Empire. He traveled to
Istanbul as part of his campaign and gave the proposal to Fuad
Pasha, the Ottoman prime minister. The proposal was considered in
the Ottoman Society of Science per the prime minister's orders.
Despite appreciating Akhundov's effort, little was done to promote
it.
Despite the project's failure, Akhundov did not give up on the
concept of reforming the alphabet. He worked harder and more
passionately on the concept, creating a second draft alphabet that
was likewise based on Arabic. He eventually decided against using
the Arabic alphabet and created a new Latin alphabet for Azerbaijan
instead.
Despite Akhundov's extensive efforts, the Latin alphabet was not
adopted during his lifetime. However, it became real in the 20th
century when the independent Azerbaijani Republic chose it as its
official alphabet. This confirmed Akhundov's belief that Azerbaijan
would have to integrate into Europe and the West.
Mirza Fatali Ahkhundov eliminated the outmoded, decrepit clichés
and replaced them with fresh, democratic ideals as both an author
and a reformer.
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