Generic Factors and the Context of Empire in Kirghiz Oral Heroic Poetry from the Mid Nineteenth to the Early Twentieth Century
Generic Factors and the Context of Empire in Kirghiz Oral Heroic Poetry from the Mid Nineteenth to the Early Twentieth Century

Summary/Abstract: It is widely recognized that the expansion of the Russian Empire into Central Asia in the nineteenth century brought the peoples of the region face to face not only with foreign, non-Muslim, imperial rulers and colonists, but also with the realization that their traditional way of life was unequal to the rapid onslaught of an alien power. Particularly for settled people in Turkestan, and to some (less-studied) extent for nomads and former nomads in Semirech'e and the steppes, the blow to self-confidence they suffered was all the more vexing for the appearance, after native rule ended, of improvements in some (but certainly not all) aspects their lives. These psychic stresses are evident in different ways in the surviving literature of the time. Scholars focus primarily on three trends in the literature of Central Asian Muslims that can be labeled popular "revolt" and resistance, from the point of view that the Russian advance was a bad thing; progressive "reform" and accommodation, where the Russian presence could be viewed equivocally or even positively; 1 and pessimistic "resignation" and introspection, where Russian domination was more a symptom than a cause of generalized malaise.2 Guy Imart essentially summarized the cultural context of literary works of all these categories from the point of view of Moldo Qilic (1868-1917), a Kirghiz poet whose written works include a famous example of the third trend, Qissa-i zilzila 'Story of the Earthquake'.

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