Arab Shamilov ( ku, Ә'рәб Шамилов, translit=Erebê Şemo, 23 October 1897 – 1978) was a

Yazidi Yazidis or Yezidis (; ku, ئێزیدی, translit=Êzidî) are a Kurmanji-speaking endogamous minority group who are indigenous to Kurdistan, a geographical region in Western Asia that includes parts of Iraq, Syria, Turkey and Iran. The ma ...

Kurdish Kurdish may refer to: *Kurds or Kurdish people *Kurdish languages *Kurdish alphabets *Kurdistan, the land of the Kurdish people which includes: **Southern Kurdistan **Eastern Kurdistan **Northern Kurdistan **Western Kurdistan See also * Kurd (dis ...

novelist who lived in the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

Early career

During

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

, from 1914 to 1917, he served as an interpreter for the Russian army. Later on, he became a member of the central committee of the

Armenian Communist Party The Armenian Communist Party ( hy, Հայաստանի կոմունիստական կուսակցություն, ՀԿԿ; ''Hayastani Komunistakan Kusaktsutyun'', HKK) is a communist party in Armenia. It considers itself the successor to the Armenia ...

. In 1931, he began working on

Kurdish literature Kurdish literature (, ) is literature written in the Kurdish languages. Literary Kurdish works have been written in each of the four main languages: Zaza, Gorani, Kurmanji and Sorani. Ali Hariri (1009–1079) is one of the first well-known po ...

at the Leningrad Institute of Oriental Studies. He assisted in developing a

Latin-based alphabet A Latin-script alphabet (Latin alphabet or Roman alphabet) is an alphabet that uses letters of the Latin script. The 21-letter archaic Latin alphabet and the 23-letter classical Latin alphabet belong to the oldest of this group. The 26-letter ...

for the Kurdish language in 1927. He became a member of the editorial board of the

Kurdish newspaper The first Kurdish newspaper titled ''Kurdistan'', was published in Cairo in 1898. Since then tens of different Kurdish newspapers, magazines and journals have been published in Ottoman Empire, Iraq, Armenia, Syria, Lebanon and Iran and in recent y ...

'' Riya Teze'' (''The New Path''), published in

Yerevan Yerevan ( , , hy, Երևան , sometimes spelled Erevan) is the capital and largest city of Armenia and one of the world's oldest continuously inhabited cities. Situated along the Hrazdan River, Yerevan is the administrative, cultural, and ...

from 1930 to 1937. In Leningrad, he also met the Kurdish linguist Qenatê Kurdo and published his work as a document about Kurdish language in Armenia.

Literary output

His first and most celebrated work, the story ̧''Sivanê kurmanca û Kurdên Elegezê'' (The Kurdish shepherd and the Kurds from Alagyaz), based on his own life, was published in 1935. It is considered the first

Kurmanji Kurmanji ( ku, کورمانجی, lit=Kurdish, translit=Kurmancî, also termed Northern Kurdish, is the northern dialect of the Kurdish languages, spoken predominantly in southeast Turkey, northwest and northeast Iran, northern Iraq, northern S ...

novel. It treated his early life as a Sheperd and how he then turned communist and took part in the

Russian Revolution of 1917 The Russian Revolution was a period of political and social revolution that took place in the former Russian Empire which began during the First World War. This period saw Russia abolish its monarchy and adopt a socialist form of government ...

. In 1937, he was exiled by

Joseph Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili; – 5 March 1953) was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet political leader who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secreta ...

and was only allowed to return to Armenia after 19 years, in 1956, following Stalin's death. Arab Shamilov's plaque, Yerevan

In 1959, he published another novel, '' (Жийина бәхтәwар)'' (meaning: ''Happy Life'') that was then translated into Armenian and later also into Russian (1965). In 1966, he published a historical novel, ''Dimdim'', inspired by the old Kurdish folk tale of ' about the battle of Dimdim. It has been translated into Italian as well (as '). In 1967, he published a collection of Kurmanji folk stories in Moscow.

Books

# ''Şivanê Kurmanca'', the first Kurdish novel # ''Barbang'' (1958) (published in Yerevan by Haypetrat, 1959) # ''Jiyana Bextewar'' (1959) (re-release: Roja Nû Publishers, 1990, 253 p.) # ''Dimdim'' (1966) (re-release: Roja Nû Publishers, 1983, 205 p.) # ''Hopo'' (1969) (re-release: Roja Nû Publishers, 1990, 208 p.)

References

Avesta Cultural Magazine (in Kurdish)

* Shamilov, Arab, "Dastanî Qelay Dimdim", Kurdish Academy of Baghdad, 1975. {{DEFAULTSORT:Shamilov, Arab Kurdish-language writers Kurdish writers Kurdish people 1897 births 1978 deaths Soviet novelists Soviet male writers 20th-century male writers Recipients of the Order of Friendship of Peoples Recipients of the Order of the Red Banner Kurds in Armenia Armenian Yazidis