A History of Kyrgyzstan from 1900 to the Present Day

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Literature in South Asia: 1900- Present

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1900 to Present

Literature 241

move onto collective farms. In addition, many leading Kyrgyz citizens were killed in Joseph Stalin’s purges.

These three actions led to the temporary resurgence of the basmachi, a sect of Muslim fighters. The origi- nal movement was defeated during the Russian Civil War by General Mikhail Frunze, for whom Bishkek was renamed until independence.

Kyrgyzstan formally declared independence on August 31, 1991, after the failed Soviet coup against Mikhail Gorbachev. Askar Akayev, the president of the Kyrgyz Academy of Sciences, was elected as its first president. Akayev began his rule as a true reformer, bringing in the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to introduce shock-therapy reforms to the Soviet-era economy. For this, Kyrgyzstan was once considered an “island of democracy” and the “Switzerland of central Asia.” However, these reforms were short-lived, as Akayev was soon accused of both economic and political corruption. It is probable that his electoral wins in 1995 and 2000 and parliamentary elections in 2005 were rigged.

Immediately following the February–March 2005 elections in which Akayev’s son and daughter won parliamentary seats, protests originated in the southern cities of Jalalabad and Osh over fears that there would be a dynastic succession. These protests quickly spread to Bishkek, leading to the Tulip Revo- lution and Akayev’s resignation in April.

He was succeeded by Kurmanbek Bakiyev, whose initial promises to institute a reform program were not realized. Bakiyev was overthrown in a revolution in April 2010, which also caused Kyrgyz–Uzbek ethnic violence in the south of the country. Roza Otun- baeva assumed the presidency, and held what were deemed by the international community to be open and fair parliamentary elections in October 2010.

The country today remains culturally divided between the northern section, which is more educated and leans more toward Russia, and the south, which leans more toward Uzbekistan, with whom it shares the Ferghana Valley and a common regional history.

Jonathan Z. Ludwig Rice University See Also: Kazakhstan; Russia; Soviet Union in Central Asia; Uzbekistan.

Further Readings

Anderson, John. Kyrgyzstan: Central Asia’s Island of Democracy? Abingdon, UK: OPA, 1999.

Hiro, Dilip. Inside Central Asia. London: Overlook Duckworth, 2009.

Olcott, Martha Brill. Central Asia’s Second Chance.

Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2005.

Stewart, Rowan, et al. Kyrgyz Republic: Heart of Central Asia. Leicester, UK: Odyssey Publications, 2008.

Literature

South and central Asia have hundreds of modern liv- ing languages and dialects, as well as a rich tradition of ancient languages. While there have been some moves toward a homogeneous national language in each of the countries in these regions, some more successful than others, a large number of regional language traditions and dialects have survived and continue to thrive in the form of vibrant literature.

This makes it impossible to speak of a national literature, and any study of the regional literatures needs to take into account the complex dynamics between various literary traditions, languages, and peoples as well as the existing multilingualism of the region.

Epics, Oral Narratives, and the Influence of the Past The existence of a vast body of premodern oral literature in both south and central Asia has had a conten- tious influence on the literature of the 20th century.

Several literary histories of south Asia contend that oral literary traditions were ignored by the Western- educated elite, who produced literature that was largely influenced by European literary forms. These new literary genres were a sharp departure from ear- lier forms of literature. However, cultural historians argue that the epics and oral narratives continue to inform not just literature, but also other cultural forms in south Asia. While popular literary genres in contemporary south Asia, such as the novel and the autobiography, were products of a postcolonial sen- sibility, the thematic influence of the epics and oral folk literature cannot be ignored. Shashi Tharoor’s The Great Indian Novel (English, 1989) exemplifies this. Literature in modern Indian languages such as

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19 00 to P re se nt

242 Literature

Kuvempu’s Sri Ramayana Darshanam (Kannada, 1949, 1957), Dharamvir Bharti’s play Andha Yug (Hindi, 1954), and Nanalal’s 12-volume epic poem Kurukshetra (Gujarati, 1926–40) have drawn inspira- tion from the epics and often attempted to reinterpret and rewrite them.

The trajectory of the oral and folk literature of central Asia in the 20th century was much more political.

The late 19th and early 20th centuries saw remarkable efforts to write and print the traditional oral literature. This process was continued in the period after the Bolshevik Revolution by the Oriental Institutes under Soviet control. Oral narratives were recorded and stowed away in archives, rather than published and disseminated. The publication of “traditional literature” was banned in the early 1950s but was resumed in the late 1950s. The new process, however, only allowed the publication of “approved” ver- sions of the traditional dastans (narratives/stories).

Moreover, newer dastans—such as “Ode to the Col- lective Farm”—with more socialist themes attempted to replace patriarchal heroes from the older dastans because they were seen as feudal and not in keeping with socialist realism.

Socialist Realism

In the Soviet period in central Asia, writers were expected to conform to the principles of socialist realism. Accordingly, literature was understood as a medium of mass instruction and was expected to appeal to the largest numbers. Literature was to be realistic in both form and content; thus, the novel as a genre was deemed most appropriate, followed by plays. Traditional epics such as Manas and Alpamysh’

were banned for their fantastic content and feudal message. Within socialist realism, the function of literature was to provide hope for the future, replac- ing God as the opiate of the masses. Maxim Gorky, to whom the founding of the socialist realism movement is attributed, was set up as a model writer, especially for non–Russian-language writers in the central Asian regions.

The October Revolution and socialist realism had a profound impact on writers in south Asia. Writers such as Subramania Bharti, Allama Iqbaal, and Kazi Nazrul Islam welcomed the revolution as the begin- ning of a new age that gave hope to people’s strug- gles all over the world. The novels of Hindi writers

Gopal Haldar and Yashpal, in which the protagonists, after their tryst with terrorism and violence, reject Gandhi’s philosophy in favor of communism, best exemplify the influence of the Soviet Revolution and socialist realism.

Literature of Politics and the Politics of Literature The 20th century was a period of great political upheaval for the regions of south and central Asia.

Literature not only captured these political goings-on, but in most cases, it was also exploited as a medium of social change and for the stirring of public con- sciousness. The first half of the 20th century was for most regions in south Asia the period of the struggle for independence. Songs of freedom rang through- out what are now the countries of India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. Rabindranath Tagore was a freedom fighter, painter, avid educationalist, and the writer and composer of the national anthems of India and Bangladesh and the army song of Pakistan. Writ- ers like Tagore wrote novels, poems, and plays about social emancipation and about a utopian independent nation. Early political literature included translations of the works of Soviet writers (e.g., Krovvidi Lingara- ju’s Amma [1934] is a translation of Gorky’s Mother) and inspirational songs and poems of freedom. Many of these songs became state songs, army songs, and even national anthems and national songs of independent India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh.

As indigenous writers began to employ the genre of the novel (the earliest of which can be dated to the 1850s) as expressions of anticolonial, antifeudal, and anticaste movements, the novel form also seemed to sever its ontological linkages to the European and Anglo-Saxon tradition, and become a vehicle for social change and literary expression of the citizens of a new nation. The earliest political novels in modern Indian languages, such as Datta Appaji Tuyapurkar’s Mazhe Ramayana (Marathi, 1927), Sevak Bhojraj’s Ashirwad (Sindhi, 1932), S. Panaippam Chettiyar’s Kantinati (Tamil, 1926), and Munshi Premchand’s Maidan-i- Amal (Hindi-Urdu, 1932) all coincided with the most intense period of the nationalist movement and the Gandhian period of Indian politics. Satinath Bhaduri, an active participant in the freedom movement, wrote Jagari (1946) when jailed during the Quit India Move- ment. The novel is an excellent example of the political, ideological, and familial conflict of people who

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1900 to Present

Madrassas 243

were being jailed and hanged during the nationalist movement. Jagari, as well as Jayanti Dalal’s Padarnan Tirath, written in the same year and set in the Quit India Movement, indicate the maturity of the Indian political novel.

Political fiction, especially political novels, became popular in Soviet central Asia in the face of the strict censorship imposed on ethnic and nationalistic historical writing. Mamadali Mahmudov’s Olmez Kaya- lar (1981), Ilyas Esenberlin’s Altin Orda (1982), and Alishir Ibadinov’s Kuyas ham Alav (1980) all attempted to “re-present” the historical past of the central Asian regions, with particular emphasis on the invasion of the Russian armies and, in some cases, even resistance to Islam by the more authentic and older traditions of central Asia. While demonstrating an adept use of the novel form, the post-Stalinist writers demonstrate an interesting exploration of their past while addressing political concerns of the present.

Postcolonial Literature

The euphoria of independence tempered by the hor- ror of the bloody partition of British India into the nations of India and Pakistan gave birth to a multi- layered and complex literature. Salman Rushdie’s Midnight Children (1981), Kushwant Singh’s Train to Pakistan (1956), and Saadat Hasan Manto’s Toba Tek Singh (1955) reflect the ambiguity of political independence, expressing the identity crises of individuals in an unstable world. With the promise of independence delivered, the realities of nation-building along with its mundane challenges of corruption, inefficiency, and confusion began to be portrayed by writers and poets of post-independence India and Pakistan. Raag Darbari by Srilal Shukla (Hindi, 1968) is a novel that traverses the villages of north India, revealing the hilariously inadequate sociopolitical structures. The novel also demonstrates the use of Hinglish that soon became very popular with Indian writers.

The last decades of the 20th century gave birth to more experimental and stylistically diverse and excit- ing literature in south Asia that was more self-con- scious as a literary form rather than as a medium of social change. The works of writers such as Amitav Ghosh, Vikram Seth, Arundhati Roy, Shyam Selvadu- rai, and Sara Suleri, although often rooted in south Asian experiences, have received recognition at the global level.

The Post-Soviet Period

Contemporary writing from central Asia has been in the shadows and, with the world watching the emergence of new nations from the collapsed Soviet Empire, the indigenous writers find themselves pres- sured either to retreat to an ancient historical period in search of an authentic narrative, or find the figure of Stalin looming large in their work. The works of popular writers Chingis Aitmatov, Andrey Volos, and Hamid Ismailov bear witness to this.

Exiled No More: Post-National Literature

The contemporary writing of both south and central Asia often comes from those who have been estranged from the region. What began as writing in exile or longing for home has now become unapolo- getic, non-nostalgic writing by authors and poets with hyphenated nationalities. These include Tahima Anam, Kamila Shamsie, and Yasmine Gooneratne.

Meera Ashar University of Cambridge See Also: Art; Gandhi, Mohandas; Modernity;

Music; Nationalism; Popular Culture; Radio; Tagore, Rabindranath; Television; Theater and Film.

Further Readings

Das, Sisir Kumar. A History of Indian Literature, 1911–

1956: Struggle for Freedom: Triumph and Tragedy. New Delhi, India: Sahitya Akademi, 2010.

Jayasuriya, Wilfrid. Sri Lanka’s Modern English Literature:

A Case Study in Literary Theory. New Delhi, India:

Navrang, 1994.

Mehrotra, Arvind Krishna. A Concise History of Indian Literature in English. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.

Paksoy, H. B. Lectures on Central Asia. Budapest,

Hungary: Central European University Budapest, 2005.

Madrassas

Madrassa has been derived from the Arabic word dars, which means “a lesson.” It is also written as madrasa, madrasah, and madarsah, the plural of which is madaris in Arabic and madrassas in English.

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