Paltore Yktiyar
Kazakhstan /Al Farabi
Kazakh National University
Kazakh literary language and Abai
Nowadays Kazakh
literary language occupies status of official language of the Republic of Kazakhstan. It is widely used in Kazakh
social life aspects, in belles-lettres and publishing, radio and television, in
education and science, official documents spheres.
Initially
investigators accepted literary language as analogue of written language and
somewhat opposing colloquial language. Reasons for the misconception were the
languages that had early formation of written language and historical
monuments. Some of the investigators thought that literality of the language
was based on its commonness to everyone. Absence of dialects, slang words make
literary language peculiar. Generally, those who have that point of view find
literary language precedent to the times when language was used as folk poetic
art, and language of regulations. Works devoted to investigation of Kazakh
literary language state the same opinion. For
instance, some of investigators (such as Қ. Æұìàғàëèåâ, Ì.
Áàëàқàåâ (K. Zhumagaliev, M. Balakaev)) connect Kazakh literary language appearance with the times when
written literature appeared
and language itself was normally formed and started to atrract elements of
style (XVII century). Another group of investigators (Қ.
Æұáàíîâ. Ñ. Àìàíæîëîâ, I. Êåңåñáàåâ ò. á. (K. Zhubanov,
S.Amanzholov, I. Kenesbayev etc.)) state that Kazakh literary language began in
the second half of XIX century when book and newspaper printing was widespread along with Abai, Shakarim works.
Generally before
the second half of XIX century only official documents were printed, further
works in different styles began to be printed. There were plenty of reasons for
this enrichment of Kazakh literary language. First of all, due to dependence to
Russian Empire, some of Kazakh youth had had an opportunity to study in Russian
schools, therefore to be familiar with European culture.
Among kazakh nation enlighteners such as Abai, Shokan, Ibirai called young
generation to strive for knowledge and were good role models for that. Finally kazakh schools were set, publishing in Kazakh
language was developing, and works of kazakh authors started to be published. This was the reason of Kazakh literary language
fluorish.
Abai Kunanbaiuly
was born in 1845 in East Kazakhstan area and passed away in 1904 in his
hometown. His first name is Ibrahim. The name is registered in official
documents. But he is widely known by name “Abai” which was indulgently given by
his grandmother Zere and his mother Ulzhan since his childhood.
Abai Kunanbaiuly
in Kazakhstan is famous for being enlightener, composer, interpreter, social
agent, philosopher, reformer, who wanted to enrich Kazakh literature by
emergence with Russian and European culture, and also as a founder of Kazakh
written literary language.
His father Kunanbay Oskenbaiuly (1804-1883)
was noticed by his awareness of social situations, intelligence, oratory
ability, magnificent ability to govern, leadership. He spoke fluent Russian and
dealt with Russian nobility.
“Kunanbay saved old
national identities and was trustee from Russian empire to Kazakhs. He was
first sultan to work in his clan. During his times forces of Kazakh khanate was
weakened and Kazakhstan emerged to Russian
empire.” [1]
Abai was born
when his father was apart from his forties. One of Kunanbay’s significant
qualities is ability to sort out people. He foresaw his offspring’s talent,
eloquence, cleverness and knew he could expect much. That’s why he took him
into attention and taught him early.
It might be said
that his grandmother Zere and mother Ulzhan
brought up him in cultural motions by
means of witty words of spokesmen, fairytales and proverbs and sayings from his
early ages. Another reason for it is frequent visit of poets and
storytellers to his country. Hence, Abaiheard folk
songs, stories, fairytales, poems from kazakh’s famous poets,singers,composers.
His grandmother significantly
affected his life and poetic activity.
His first teacher
was mullah Gabithan hired by his father. When he was ten his father sent him to
Ahmet Rizah’s madrasah in Semey city. In madrasahs of that
times books were in themes of “…nahu(syntax of Arabic language), fikh (muslim right),
forty hadises, sharh Gabdolla, ahlak(ethics), mantiq(logics), islam history,
works of sufi poets as well.” [2] Abaieasily
learned the subjects and learned eastern languages as Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Chagataish. Therefore he learned works
of eastern classic poets in the face of Phizuli, Shamsi, Saghdi, Nauaii,
Saihali, Phirdausi. He
started to write poems emulating them. Here is an
example of his eastern poetry start: “Iuzi – rose, eyes are diamonds…”.
In the last years
at the madrasah Abai, along with muslim studying, went to “Prihodskaya School”
and studied in Russian language approximately three months. Then when he was
fourteen his father took him back and taught how to govern. It gave to young,
intelligent and clever fellow opportunity to have an experience in seizing people,
place, traditions and cultures, customs.
“…he was smart
for his 15 years. He amazed people. He argued with previous governors. He
helped his father a lot…” [3]
Following his
father he gets in the range of spokesmen. He grasped brevity and investigated
old rhetoric by means of sayings and proverbs, poems from them. Hence, being
familiar with eastern and Russian culture, as well as with history of his
nation, socio-political conditions he started to be recognized. “When he was
twenty he was called first orator, expert of legislation. He knew how to deal
with governors from other places. Thanks to his inquisitiveness and remembrance
he was very intelligent in terms of folk legends, sayings and proverbs,
aphorisms and fairytales.” [4]
“Khaliolla
Oskenbayev, his younger brother, was first person who introduced Abai with
Russian artistry, books and with noble disposition of Saint-Petersburg, Moscow.
Khaliolla was his father’s first wife Aygyz’s son, and his father (Kunanbai)
sent him to study in Russian language from his early years. Abai and he would often correspond with each other. [5]
When Khaliolla came back to summer vacations he would
bring lots of stories and books, which Abai used to read frequently and share his secrets with Khaliolla and was significantly
wit amongst grandchildren.” [6]
In the end of 1860s
Abai read lots of books in Russian
language, had independently improved his Russian language. Eventually, in 1870
he meets exiled revolutioner from Saint-Peterburg E.P.Mikhaelis in the library
of Semey city. With his assistance he learns to select proper literature and read systematically. In 1880s
Abai, owing to Milkhaelis acquaintances with exiled democrats as Dolgopolov, Leontiev.
Abai Kunanbaiuly
learned Russian, western, philosophic, social literature. Distinctively, he
read and cracked the books of classics of Russian literature such as Pushkin,
Lermontov, Saltykov-Shedrin, Nekrasov, Tolstoi and works of revolutionists such
as Belinskii, Gertsen, Chernyshevskii, Dobroliubov. Additionally he learned
translated works of European poets and scholars, ancient philosophers such as
Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Byron, Goethe, A. Duma, Spencer, Lewis, Darwin,
Draper and had an opportunity to learn other prominent writers works.
“According to his friends Abai he was interested in western philosophy (For
instance, it is known that he read works of Spinoza and Spencer and inquired
about Darwin)…” [7] Professor of New York University John William Draper was one of the
most prominent affecters and informers for him. With help of his old friend Eugenie Petrovich Mikhaelis Abai found and
read with interest Draper’s translated work “Europanyn akyl-oyunun damu tarihy”
("History of the intellectual development of
Europe") (1869) in
two volumes and “Katolitsizm men gylymnin arasindagi katynas tarihi” ("History of the conflict between religion and science") (1876) which was embedded into Russian higher education.
Eventually “blend
of three ultimate cultures were Abai’s inspiration. His great inspiration that
affected his thoughts, social life and poetry was rich ancient folk culture
which was word-of-mouth, some of which were saved in printed matters. His
another great inspiration channel was marvelous eastern cultural heritage
Arabic-Iranian and Turkish classic poesy, third channel was Russian and
European culture” [8]
Abai kept
enriching his knowledge, worldview. His scrutiny in Russian literature and
vernacular of XIX century brought
him to another notion about his poetic mission. Abai estimated art of word as
social power, social issue. In combine all of this awaken and determined,
developed poetic talent in him.
Abai felt like being
reborn after reading Draper’s works. With each paragraph he acknowledged new
data and upgraded his outlook. While reading “Europanyn akyl-oyunun damu
tarihy” ("History of the intellectual development of Europe") he
found out that all the phenomenon depend upon it and its power affects human
and non-human beings. When reading “Katolitsizm men
gylymnin arasindagi katynas tarihi” ("History of the
conflict between religion and science")
he found out that basis of all the sciences is religion. He understood that
illiteracy of religion representatives, bareness of aims convert religion to
dogma, and more, that explorations of great masterminds of the world uncover
mysteries of universe and lift up science to newer extend. Eventually, as time
goes by, Abai’s name gets around with his outstanding thoughts, peculiarities
of his compositions.
Abai’s output began
early. Although his poems became systematic, poetric only in 1882. He has
twenty years of literary and poetic activity background. We have almost seven
thousand poems extant, in other words “ approximately 170 poems written by
himself, others(56) mainly translations of Russian and European
ones. Plenty of translations from Russian classics belong to M. Lermontov, and poems and fables of Pushkin and
Krylov.
His
unique creature in history of kazakh literature which differs by its genre and
style was his 45 words of wisdom («The Book of Words» (Kazakh: «Қàðà Ñөçäåði» «Qàrà So'zderi») and one historical article.” [9]
And he has three more poems such as «Åñêåíä³ð»,
«Ìàғñұò», «Әç³ì» («Eskend³r», «Màghsut», «A'z³m»)
Abai Kunanbaiuly
“used foreign words to express himself sharply, to support his words, as well
as to clarify, elucidate his thoughts. Most of uncommon nouns (ñèÿç, ãóáåðíàòîð, çàêîí ò.á (siyaz, gubernator,
zakon) give to us information
about the epoch. Besides Arabic and Persian common words and loanwords from
Quran in his words of edification show us his awareness of this languages and
covers up his aim to clarify and define their meanings to us. There are more
than 578 words and phrases of that kind in his works. 402 of them are Arabic,
50 are Persian, five Latin, 25 Tatarian, Nogai, 62 Russian, 27 Shaghatai, 4
Turkish, and some of them are Greek, polish, Chinese words. Hence poet used 11 languages apart from Kazakh. We must tale into account
that some of latin, greek, polish words were learned through Russian language.
Chinese word «áðóò (brut)»,
arabic words «õèáàè (hibai)»,«õұçàғè (huzaghi)» are products of his own acivity”. [10]
One more thing that he grasped from prominent
eastern works is literary methods such as “sadj”, “iltizam” “tanasub”,
“ishtiqaq”. For instance we shall stop
at method “sadj”, which is like alliteration.
Abai wrote:
«Sorli' àsi'q sàrghàysà dà, sàghi'nsà dà, //
Jàr tàyi'p, jàqsi' so'zden jàngi'lsà dà»
As we can see int the first line there is a
repetition of consonant “s”, in the
second line “J” is repeated. The consonant “j” is might be said to be main
phoneme that differs Kazakh language from Turkish.
Additionally, there are 573 words that begin with letter «Æ» (”J”), and with 9.11 % of usage, was most commonly used letter after
consonant “T” [11]
Enriching
his genres Abai Kunanbiuly in 1890 began to write his famous “Book of Words”
which consists of 45 edifications. “The Book of Words” (prose treatises) is foundation of both publicistic and scientific (edificatory-narrative) styles, as well as
narrative literature style, which got
their further development and flourishing with subsequent Kazakh writers of
post-Abai period. The poet laid down and developed his deep thoughts about
different sides of life, philosophic and ethic problems sometimes in oral
vernacular, sometimes in high rhetorical, sometimes in scientific-protreptic
styles. In 1933 The Book of
Words was published, where his philosophic thinkings regarding history,
enlightenment, etc. were included.
By lexical composition these “words” somewhat differ
from poesies. Here the author sometimes
resorts to Koranic terms, bookish-literary forms and expressions..
There are separate Arabic and Iranian whole
constructions in “The Book of Words”: ñèôàò-çàòèÿ (si''fàt-zàti''ya)
- peculiar to them themselves, әñìà
è
õóñíà
(a'smà i'' hwsnà) -
noble names and so on (the most of them are in word 38: õàóàñ
ñәëèì
(hàwàs sa'li''m) -
noble features, äәôû
ìóçàððàò (da'fi' mwzàrràt) – for the avoidance of
evil, ñàëëàëàõó
ғàëàéõè óә
ñàëàì (sàllàlàhw ghàlàyhi'' wa' sàllàm) - may Allah bless Mohammad – the “Prophet” – Islam
bearer, standard-bearer. By estimate of some philologists, the quantity of Arabic and Iranian words comes
up to three hundred and odd. This figure shall not frighten us. First,
almost a good half of them (more than 180 Arabic
and Iranian words and constructions) is presented in word 38 (sporadically, of course, they have place in other
works as well). Second, we shall not forget that Abai in most cases made use of
these Arabic and Iranian elements
barely for the purposes to reproduce Islamic-religious world outlook, and typical features of culture, household life
patterns of a definite epoch. On the general background of Abai’s
literary vocabulary these loanwords from Arabic
and Iranian words and word combinations take trifling place.
We must not leave out of account two-way nature of
these Eastern words. Their
majority is assimilated to an extent that initial foreign phonetic pattern of
loanwords became almost imperceptible or imperceptible at all.
Writer, who
mainly investigated Abai’s life, wrote: “it is valuable in each era, it’s a
great treasure”. It is new genre – publicistic and scientific styles written in
prose. So Abai understood that language must be developed and actively attended
in it. as well as his poems this genre is written in common Kazakh language.” [12]
Abai recognized
the importance of language in social life, and look at language from national,
public aspects, and made a great contribution to its progress. By embedding new
methods, he enriched, developed Kazakh literary language. Also he also might be
recognized as one who embedded genre of scene poem with his three poems Åñêåíä³ð», «Ìàғñұò», «Әç³ì» («Eskend³r», «Màghsut»,
«A'z³m»).
Abai early
attended governing and had lots of problems because of his strive for just. In times of frustration he
turned to poetry. He compared poem to king of
writing, and found it best way to expression. That’s why he wrote: («...Bo'ten so'zben bi'lghànsà so'z sàràsi', // Ol àqi'nni'ng b³l³ms³z
bi''shàràsi'...»)
So he didn’t allow
ignorance in poetry, raised the bar of poetry.
He addressed to listeners:
(«So'z tu'zeld³, ti'ngdàwshi', sen de tu'zel, //
Senderge de keley³n end³ àyangdàp...») So
he invoked people to get better.
He developed
rhyming in poesy and tried to modernize next generation. He became genius of
Kazakh nation.
In conclusion, era
of Abai was full of events in
social, common, cultural and economic life in Kazakhstan. “In social development there was a tendency of supporting common people.
It gave
birth to democratic ideology. There was a need to
literate common people”. [13]
The role of language in this mission was obvious. Heretofore, middle Asian
written literary language (bookish language, Shagahatai language combined with
Turkish) tried to be prevented from common usage. Only religious and
epistologic areas were spread in literature. That’s why common people needed
understandable and easy language. As it would affect cultural, social,
spiritual life and self-development. Abai found literary language suitable this
role and worked hard to form this language. It also affected his creation. So
he made significant changes in Kazakh language vocabulary. He also added to his
poems common words rarely used by previous poets, common vocabulary, obsolete
words which were used as professionalisms, new words and converted them into
means of poesy.
In his works,
along with covering common, social, religious, moral problems introduced fresh
similes, epithets, metaphors, which was unknown in Kazakh poetry. They existed
before him, but he upgraded them, gave them new character.
Additionally, “…to
make new characters and support author’s idea,
Abai offered method of using one word as component of different phraseologisms. This was new phenomena in this sphere. For example, verb
«ñàòó» (sàtw) (to sale) Abai used in different meanings so it took meaning to
betray, be unfaithful, to break trust, to deceive, to mislead,to cheat,to fool,
to lie etc.( ñàқàë [ûí] ñàòó, ( sàqàl [i'n] sàtw),
àð-ұÿòûí ñàòó, (àr-uyati'n sàtw), æàқûíûí ñàòó, (jàqi'ni'n
sàtw), àðûí ñàòó, (àri'n sàtw), åңáåã³í ñàòó, ( engbeg³n
sàtu) («åңáåã³íå ñүéåíó»), æàí ñàòó (jàn sàtu)
(«æàíûí ïèäà қûëó»), êөç³í ñàòó (ko'z³n sàtu) («òåëì³ðó,
ò³ëåíó»), ñөç ñàòó (so'z sàtu) («ñөç³í áұëäàó,
ñөç³í á³ð êåðåã³ үø³í өòê³çó»), òåð³í ñàòó, (ter³n
sàtu) («êүø-қàéðàòûí åңáåêêå æұìñàó»), êүëê³
ñàòó (ku'lk³ sàtu) («àëäàó, êөëã³ðñó»), қóëûқ
ñàòó (qwli'q sàtu) («қóëûғûí àñûðó, àëäàó»),
қóëûғûí ñàòó (quli'ghi'n sàtu) («өò³ð³ê
òûңäàғàíñó»), қûëûғûí ñàòó (qi'li'ghi'n sàtu)
(«әðåêåò³í æұìñàó»), әí³í ñàòó (a'n³n sàtw)
(«àқûíäûқ өíåð³í áұëäàó, îíû ïàéäà үø³í
æұìñàó»), æүðåã³í ұñòàï ñàòó (ju'reg³n ustàp sàtu)
(«ñûðòûíàí èåìäåíó, áàñûí ñàóäàғà ñàëó»), æүç³í ñàòó (ju'z³n
sàtu) («өò³ð³ê æàқñû êөð³íó»). [14]
Abai followed two
methods when converting old phraseologies. One is to replace one word in phrase
with its synonym, another is to take old phraseology’s main idea. For example,
there are 309 types of phraseology repeated in his works, so 32 of them
phraseologies that were created by him. Moreover, there are 64 saying and
proverbs in his works, in which 19 are changed and suited to context. He even
analyzed and criticized some of proverbs and sayings in his 3rd, 13th, 29th edifications in his book of words.
Furthermore, Abai used 68 aphorisms as proverb or saying.
These are his methods and ways to enrich Kazakh literary language.
“There are 158
words were frequently used in half of the texts of his works. These are only
2.5 % of 6293 words of his vocabulary bank… if we analyze frequency of parts of
speech we can give this data: nouns - 15 758
(33,82%), verbs - 15 266 (32,76%), prepositions - 1046 (4,39%),
adverbs - 1686 (3,62%),pronouns - 4473 (9,60%), interjections - 144 (0,31%), onomatopoeia - 87
(0,19%), parenthesis - 674 (1, 45%), numerals 1074 (2,30%), modal words - 964
(2,06%)” [15]
Abai
is ultimate folklore and combiner of eastern and western civilizations.
Furthermore, “he is founder of qualitative contemporary Kazakh written literary
language. This language is basis of modern written literary language. Concretely, language of Abai is language of national written literary
language…He is not only founder, he is developer,
manager, and determiner of normalizing”. [16]
Nature of Abai is
indicator of Kazakh and world literature’s glory. He compound eastern poet’s
description of nature with beauty of being found and showed aesthetics in that
way. So this is his contribution into bringing lyrical poemsof
second half of XIX century and beginning of XX century into classical level.
Generally, Abai
was born in rich noble family and was brought up by his father Kunanbai. He
strived for knowledge from his early years, by learning eastern languages,
Russian language read lots of books and extended his outlook. This is how he
went ahead his times. “He spent his years in sorrows and grieves.
What for? He had everything: estate, glory, respect. But why he was so
frustrated? Because he worried, carried about his community”. [17]
He was not satisfied with the social life of his times. He dreamed to have his young generation educated and want them to take
after developed cultures. He served for it. He made as much efforts as possible
to better off Kazakh people and
developed and enriched opportunities of Kazakh literary language.
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