JAVID MEANS ETERNITY

This year we will celebrate the 140th anniversary of the playwright and poet Huseyn Javid. President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev signed a decree to hold the celebration events. A memorial plate was unveiled recently in Washington, DC on the occasion of the anniversary.

The memorial plate made by young sculptor Kamran Asadov was installed on the administrative building of the American-Azerbaijani Chamber of Commerce located in the historical Georgetown district of Washington, DC. The project is a product of joint efforts by the American-Azerbaijani Chamber of Commerce, the Embassy of Azerbaijan to the US and the Ministry of Culture of Azerbaijan.

The ceremony included the reading of a letter by the Mayor of Washington, DC, Marielle Bowser, declaring October 24, 2022 as Huseyn Javid Memorial Day. In addition to Javid's role in Azerbaijani literature, it mentions his struggle for freedom and against discrimination. It was underlined that Javid's ideals of a free and just world and his fight against injustice and discrimination remain relevant in our modern world.

Illuminator

The Museum of Victims of Political Repressions of the State Border Service of Azerbaijan has copies of a number of interesting documents related to Huseyn Javid.

Rasizade Huseyn Abdulla oghlu was born on October 24, 1882 in the village of Shahtakhty, Nakhchivan, Azerbaijan. After five years of study in a madrasa, he mastered his skills and knowledge in the secular school "Terbiyye" opened by the famous enlightener, poet and teacher Mohammed Taghi Sidgi. In 1898-1905, Huseyn continued his studies in Tabriz, where he perfected his knowledge with the Arabic and Persian literature. In 1905, he entered the Faculty of Philology at the Istanbul University. After completing his studies, Huseyn returned home and taught the Azerbaijani language and literature in schools of Nakhchivan, Ganja and Tiflis.

In 1906, Huseyn changed his name to Javid standing for "eternal" or "immortal" in Arabic. It was as if he knew that his dramas, poems and verses would gain immortality, that his name would always be remembered by his successors.

Undesirable Musavatist

Despite the popularity of his publications and theatrical productions based on them (The Prophet, Azer, The Prince, Teymur the Lame, Sheikh Sanan, Siyavush, Khayyam, Shahla), the Soviet authorities critically received the success of Huseyn Javid, while not abandoning attempts to turn him into a "proletarian poet", "writer of socialist realism".

At the same time, the authorities applied physical pressure on the poet. On March 29, 1926, the participants of the convention of the Azerbaijan Communist Party (Bolsheviks) Central Committee Bureau chaired by secretary A. Garayev discussed the issue of overseas trips. One of the applications discussed was the one by Huseyn Javid, where he requested the government to allow him travelling abroad for medical treatment. But his request was not approved.

Negative position of the Bolshevik authorities' towards Huseyn Javid was based on his former membership of the Musavat party. Although he officially left the ranks of the party, Javid nevertheless remained loyal to the ideas of Musavat, did not accept the Soviet ideology and did not praise in his works the alleged success of the socialist construction. While praising love in his works, Javid could not understand the love of the masses for Stalin. Speaking out against evil and violence, the poet could not approve the policy of repressions led by Stalin and his Azerbaijani associate Mir-Jafar Baghirov. Perhaps this is what he personally meant by putting the following words into the mouth of his character, the Devil: "Enough ruthless kings on earth! Amirs, shahs, kings and beys in any country are ignorant, proud, effeminate and greedy.”

National writer of Azerbaijan 

At the 12th Congress of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks) of Azerbaijan held in January 1934 Mir-Jafar Baghirov said: "Musavatists in Turkey continue to regard Huseyn Javid as a national writer of Azerbaijan. We need to engage in more decisive restructuring in the struggle against the Musavat ideology and elements" .

In one of his speeches, Javid confessed that he could not find in Azerbaijan heroes that would inspire him to write the works that the Communist Party demanded of him. Director of the publishing house Communist, A. Trinich, said at the same congressional meeting that those who think as Huseyn Javid cannot be called Soviet writers. Writer M. Huseynov suggested the congress to demand Javid to write "works on the implementation of plans on cotton and oil production". In protest against the insults and unfounded reproaches, Javid left the meeting.

Harassment of the poet continued at the Second Congress of Azerbaijani Writers held in 1937. Yet, most of the delegates respected Javid personally. Javid was greeted with applause when given the floor, but he did not make a real speech and only promised to write "about the current system, successes and heroes" in the future.

"...the Central Committee is the only master in literature and in other areas"

Javid knew well who is the originator of such a harsh attitude against him. In October 1936, he wrote a short letter to Mir-Jafar Baghirov: "Dear Comrade Mir-Jafar Baghirov! Recently I have been experiencing both morally and materially disrespectful attitude and cold misunderstanding towards myself and my works. This is nothing but a result of selective attitude of some individuals. Daring to draw your attention to this situation, I kindly ask you to take care of the condition of a sick and tired writer, who has been writing for more than thirty years. Huseyn Javid. October 3, 1936. Baku".

Javid was naïve to be unaware of Stalin's correspondence with Kaganovich in 1934: "It must be made clear to all literary communists that the Central Committee is the only master in literature and in other fields. They must obey the Committee without question.”

Signal for arrest

On June 3, 1937 at 6pm the 13th Congress of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks) of Azerbaijan began its work in Baku. In his keynote address Mirjafar Baghirov again criticised the writers. His criticism sometimes was insulting: "There are facts pointing at the presence of public enemies Talibli, Shahbazi, Ali Nazim, Ahmed Javad and others among the writers of Azerbaijan. Factionalists like Garayev, Jabiyev and others have long protected such hardcore Musavatists as Musakhanly, Huseyn Javid and others".

Baghirov's speech was like a signal for the Department of State Security of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs of Azerbaijan to launch an offensive against undesirable writers. On the same day the most prominent poets of Azerbaijan, including Huseyn Javid, Ahmed Javad and Mikayil Mushfig, were arrested. Ahmed Javad was executed in October and Mushfig in January. Huseyn Javid was kept in the KGB basement for more than two years. On June 9, 1939, the Special Board under the Soviet NKVD ruled to imprison Javid in a penal labour camp for a period of eight years for his participation in the organisation and propaganda of anti-Soviet activities.

Javid fell ill and died in Irkutsk, where he served the second part of his sentence. On December 7, 1941 he was buried in the public cemetery of the Shevchenko village, Taishet District, Irkutsk. Forty-one years later, in 1982, Heydar Aliyev, the then leader of Azerbaijan, First Secretary of the Azerbaijan Communist Party Central Committee, initiated the return and burial of Huseyn Javid's remains in Nakhchivan, the poet's homeland in Azerbaijan.