EKRĀMĪ, JALĀL

 

EKRĀMĪ, JALĀL (Jalol Ikromī; 1909-93), considered to be Tajikistan’s most important fiction writer and playwright of the Soviet period. He was born in Bukhara to the family of a judge. He attended Samarkand’s teachers training college and moved to Dushanbe in 1930, where he spent a year in prison during the 1930 purges.

Persuaded by Ṣadr-al-Dīn ʿAynī (q.v.), he abandoned poetry in favor of prose. His short story Šabe dar registoni Boḵoro (Šab-ī dar rīgestān-e Boḵārā, 1927) contrasts life under the Amir of Bukhara with that of the Soviet period. His other stories and dramas are Dušman (1933), Tuḵmi moḥabbat (Toḵm-e moḥabbat; 1934), Tirmor (Tīrmār; 1935, about printers), Zuhro (Zohrā; 1940), and Šodī (Šādī; 2 vols., 1940-49, a novel about difficulties and successes of agricultural collectivization; the first version came under ideological criticism for “deviationism”). During World War II he wrote anti-Nazi works. His psychological novel Man gunahgoram (Man gonahkār-am; 1957) was also considered “ideologically harmful.” His historical novel Tori ankabut (Tār-e ʿankabūt, 1960, also published in Persian script) deals with the transition from the Bukhara Emirate to Soviet rule. Duḵtari otaš (Doḵtar-e ātaš,1962) treats of women’s social position and popular attitudes toward the Amir of Bukhara and Russian occupation at the end of the 19th century. His novels Duvozdah darvozaiBuḵoro (Davāzdah darvāza-ye Boḵārā) and Taḵti vožgun (Taḵt-e vāžgūn) sympathetically describe the rise of the independent Bukhara Republic. Duvāzdah kīlometr (1967; publ. in 1988) condemns Stalin’s terrors. In the 1970s he returned to contemporary themes (Zogho-ye badmur; 1979). His last novel was Farzandi Ḵatlon-zamin (Farzand-e Ḵatlān-zamīn, 1984).

He wrote a number of travelogues, too, and translated the works of some Russian writers into Tajik. He also transcribed Hezār o yak šab (seeALF LAYLA WA LAYLA) and Čahār darvīš into Cyrillic Tajik.

 

Bibliography:

J. Bečka, Adabīyāt-e fārsī dar Tājīkestān, Tehran, 1372 Š./1993, pp. 152-54.

Š. Huseynzoda, Jalol Ikromī, Stalinabad, 1959.

B. Ḵudoydodov, Romani Jalol Ikromī “Duḵtari otaš", Dushanbe, 1967.

R. Muqimov, Jalol Ikromī. Dramaturg, Dushanbe, 1988.

Rypka, Hist. Iran. Lit., pp. 554-59, 574-75, 594-95, 602 no. 18.

M. Šukuruv and L. Demidčik, Nasri Jalol Ikromī, Dushanbe, 1979.

(J. Bečka)

Originally Published: December 15, 1998

Last Updated: December 9, 2011

This article is available in print.
Vol. VIII, Fasc. 3, pp. 288-289