No technological development will be able to separate a person from the taste of art- Tarana Turan Rakhimli
Interviewed by Aysel Nasirzade
Interview with Tarana Turan Rakhimli, a well-known Azerbaijani poet, scholar, educator, and journalist.
At what moment in your life, did you first feel that speaking with words could be more effective than silence?
– To be honest, I can’t remember exactly. But in my notebooks from my high school years, there are dates at the end of a few of my poems: 1983, 1984. This shows that I was already writing poetry when I was 13-14. I was a child who thought more than talked. I was more in my own world, as my father used to say, “My world of books”. Whenever I had the opportunity, I would retreat into solitude and read the works I read with avidity, and it was impossible to pull me out of it, it was almost like I lived there. With the excitement of Dreiser’s Jenny, with the compassionate philosophy of Jean Valjean Hugo, with the courageous and loving heart of Esmeralda, with the tragic courage that overturned all the canons of Anna Karenina Tolstoy , with the silence of Maria Balkonskaya, who wandered around the house like a silent shadow, whispering about many things…
I existed in such a mysterious, magical world. I remember well how my parents, worried about my insomnia due to my book addiction, forbade me from reading, and the light in the room where I slept was kept off at night. But there was a solution here too. I would lift the lid of the Jeyranpech gas stove and read until morning in the light falling from the flames. My mother sometimes thought I was sick, that I had a fever, just as my face flushed from the heat of the stove. My friendship with books, my inner dialogue with the images they contained, taught me to speak my mind and created the need to speak.
But sometimes silence can best convey what words cannot.
How does the writing process go for you psychologically? When writing, do you think about “how much will this affect the reader,” or is it just important that the writing is honest to you?
-The writing process is the realization of the need to reveal the brain and heart’s storehouse of thoughts and feelings. Just as a flower ready to bloom cannot remain curled up in a bud, it is impossible to prevent the flow of emotions and thoughts ready to be filled with words and born. It is known that all cognitive processes participate in the creation of a work of art: memory, thinking, imagination. As well as psychological (even patho-psychological!) factors, spiritual factors, etc. All of these participate in the process of creating a literary text in a complex way and are constantly intertwined and in dynamic motion. The synthesis of lyrics and psychology opens up greater opportunities for aesthetic discoveries in literature. As for the writer’s honesty, this creative factor is extremely important, even in great writers such as Hugo, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Chekhov we encounter the psychoneurotic stage of this honesty. For me, the writing process is the natural and spontaneous taking of all these things, that is, their realization without planning. Of course, not all of these qualities can be concentrated in poetry. In general, the plan-prospectus is more for epic works, as well as themes, problematic, etc. calculated for the reader’s taste.
These are not needed in poetry, the field of poetry is freer. Writing by thinking about how any poem or verse will affect the reader seems to me to be a fraud. And a wise reader will immediately feel that fraud.
What aspects of modern Azerbaijani poetry make you think the most and attract your attention? In what directions do young and middle-generation poets write today, and what topics come to the fore?
-In the contemporary literary process, poetry has always maintained its sacred place and quality. Today, the leading position of poetry is clearly visible. Of course, the emergence of the Internet makes it difficult to distinguish between “good” and “bad”, elite and popular, and sometimes creates certain confusion not only among the reader, but also among professional criticism itself. At a time when “online poets” and professional poets are mixed up in social networks, the real critical assessment of genuine creativity can also be delayed, and in the shadow of plagiarism and forgery, the brilliance of real art is sometimes hidden from view. Today, both in the world and in Azerbaijan, it is possible to observe this in the example of dozens of current poetry movements, thousands of signatures and artistic texts. Another worrying aspect is that there is serious plagiarism in poetry. You soon realize that a poem you like a little is a theft of ideas, thoughts, words from a talented poet. Or you realize that this theft is covered up with a play on words. I have repeatedly noticed that the poems or verses of many poets, such as Ramiz Rovshan, Vagif Samadoglu, Salam Sarvan… are “stolen” in this way. Although such cases are a serious concern, the aspect that generally creates optimism in our poetry is that we also have many original, valuable examples of art.
Thanks to my close acquaintance with contemporary world poetry, I can say that today Azerbaijani poetry is at a level that can keep up with the innovations in global poetry, and has even far surpassed the literature of many nations in this field. Among the current variety of themes in Azerbaijani poetry, the theme of victory, martyrdom, and the homeland in general is in a leading position. And this is far from the artificial patriotism template of the Soviet era, it is a hymn to feelings born of national and spiritual need and excitement, related to genuine love for the homeland. This aspect is striking in the creativity of all literary generations. However, somewhat different shades are also visible in the creativity of the younger literary generation, and the fact that those young poets participated in the war and felt that excitement to the core, strongly voices the power of emotions in poetry.
You are the Azerbaijani poet whose works have been published the most in foreign press, international anthologies and in various languages in recent years. How these opportunities arose for you? In which country and in what form did you meet a foreign reader for the first time?
– What I will say now may sound far from modesty, but it is a fact that often in one day I hear about the publication of my poems or interviews, analytical articles about my work in several countries. Of course, I have come a long way to reach my current successes. I see this as the fruit of literary friendships and creative relations with foreign countries that began in 1998. If my poems, stories and articles have been published in 37 languages and more than 50 countries, this was not achieved in a few years, but was achieved step by step thanks to many years of literary journey. When I started working with the Cyprus Balkans Eurasian Turkish Literatures Association in Turkey, there was no internet or current social networks. In the 90s, I was invited to the Turkish embassy in our country for a scientific article I wrote on the literature of the Western Thracian Turks and was praised.
The responsible employee of the embassy, Ümit Yardim bey, presented me with a handful of valuable books and wished me success in the work I had started – promoting the literature of the Balkan Turks. Since then, my works have been published in Turkey, Germany, Russia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan and other countries.
The friendships that were established at the international literature festival in Italy in 2016 led to the further diversification of these relations and the publication of my poems in the press of more and more countries. And I should note that I not only promote my own creativity in countries around the world, but also publish and introduce the poems of many of our poets. I feel an inner peace that the poems of many of them are published in the European press for the first time with my introduction. I do not think it is necessary to mention specific names, but today I consider it a moral duty to introduce worthy signatures of my country.
Looking to the future, what attracts you more in terms of participating in international literary projects, the spread of your poetry to wider geographies, or touching the souls of different peoples and uniting people through words?
-International literary projects primarily serve the mutual development of literatures, but on the other hand, they strengthen friendship between peoples and lay the foundation for good relations. Naturally, such events both introduce the creativity of a specific poet and create a clear idea of the nation, people to which that poet belongs, and its national-spiritual, literary-cultural values.
It is impossible to spread a word that does not touch the soul throughout the world. Even if you increase the number of countries where your poems are published thanks to literary friendships, this process cannot be sustainable. First of all, it is necessary to produce a successful work, and reader love is precisely related to this factor. The main goal of all the international projects I have been invited to and participated in so far has been to expand literary ties, share artistic experience, and use the art of words to serve peace and brotherhood in the world.
They say that as a person becomes successful, the number of people around him decreases. Sometimes there are moments when you achieve great success, but you have difficulty finding someone to share that joy with. It seems that success also brings a kind of loneliness. Have you experienced this feeling? In such moments, when you achieve success, who is the first person you call and want to share this news with?
-Success is measured first by doing quality work, and then by the value given to that work. For me, the greatest success is to complete a piece of writing properly. If this aspect of the creative process satisfies me, I believe that the door to further success will naturally open. (Of course, there are works that do not receive their due recognition in time.) No matter how much success I have had in my artistic or scientific activities, I have never felt the loneliness you mentioned. My family, relatives, friends, and colleagues who will always share this joy have been with me. The first people I shared my joy with are my mother, wife, and daughters. However, I have also experienced that situation that causes deep regret regarding the “decline of those around me” that you mentioned in your question. I lost some of my pen pals, whom I considered very close to my world, in that way.
When I shared my greatest successes, I saw the color of jealousy, sometimes even resentment, hatred in their entire faces and behaviors, and then felt the harm of these malicious feelings, and now I don’t have them in my life. But this does not bring loneliness, on the contrary, it saves me from the crowd of tiring and unnecessary people, from the shortness of breath it creates.
As an experienced poet who has been living with poetry for many years, your opinion is very interesting. It is inevitable that the taste of the reader will change over time – society changes, values, views, technologies change, and along with this, expectations from literature also differ. What do you think modern poetry should be like against the background of these changes?
– Today, as in other literary genres, we witness various new directions in poetry, and sometimes manipulations in the name of innovation. In fact, when you strip all the “isms” from literature, the artistry that remains is real art. And no matter how much the reader’s taste changes, a true work of art has no age, it is always fresh and relevant. If modern youth wants Fuzuli’s “Amazement, O Idol!” from the library for reading, if they need to read Nasimi’s ghazals and discuss them for hours, this means that no matter how much time passes and the tastes, worldviews, and views of long-distant centuries change, the magic of great art does not change. The best poems written in the modern era will also be loved and read in the future. No technological development will be able to separate a person from the taste of art. Today’s poetry should pursue modern searches without denying the literary tradition, we have a very rich poetry, so all kinds of innovations and artistic experiments should be made without damaging that richness.
Death, time, eternity – these are themes that often appear in your poems. What do you think is the meaning of human life and how does your personal belief and philosophy answer this question?
– I am a representative of the literary generation of the 90s. There are plenty of coffins and death in the poems of every poet of our generation… The source of this pessimism is connected with what we experienced in our youth, which coincided with the period of transition from one social structure to another. On the one hand, we were winged by the joy of regaining our national independence after the collapse of the Soviet empire, and we experienced the excitement of Turkism and Turanism, which had been banned for 70 years. On the other hand, we were overwhelmed by the difficulties brought by the transition from socialism to capitalism, and the troubles caused by the Karabakh war. On the one hand, the stress caused by the psychology of bribery that prevailed in higher education during our student years, and on the other hand, the news of martyrdom of our fellow students from the front… Naturally, all this was reflected in our artistic thinking and conditioned the more superior position of pessimism in our poems. After a certain age, a different perspective on the reality of death, time, and eternal existence was formed. What do I see as the meaning of human life? Nazim Hikmet used to say that a happy person is someone who rushes to work when he is at home, and to home when he is at work. For me, the respect I have at home and at work, the trust, confidence, and respect I have earned bit by bit, have always been important. The acquisition of all other values related to society is connected to this foundation. First, my position and what I have done in my family, then at my workplace, then in the whole society… And while fulfilling my mission in life, it is very important for me not to betray my character, to be able to remain myself, regardless of any obstacles or difficulties. To generously bestow that light on hearts and lives, without allowing any darkness to drown out the flood of light within me, and to be remembered with respect and love as a human being… this is the meaning of life.
Do you think Tarana Turan’s poetry is valued in Azerbaijan today? Are you satisfied with the attitude of the literary community, readers, and cultural institutions towards you?
– Valuing… It depends on what we measure value by. For many, this value is material guarantees such as providing writers with a house, being appointed to a high position, receiving a monetary award, etc. For me, being valued as a poet is the love of readers, the attitude of a literary critic towards my poems, being awarded the awards I deserve, etc. And thankfully, I have no complaints in this regard. Woe to the day when a person’s claims go miles ahead of their talent and hard work, beyond what they deserve. This has become so common in our day that… Those who write a few poems and fall into the disease of genius see the entire society and state as indebted to their self-confessed “talent”, which they have convinced themselves is a very abnormal situation. A person lives comfortably when they do not expect everything (including those forms of value that I have listed) from others… Of course, there are also disappointments caused by the fact that undeserving people snatch things from the state and society in various ways, even when you do not feel the need to make a sound with your moral satiety.
What official and literary awards have you been awarded in Azerbaijan?
-I have received awards such as the Rasul Riza Award, the Mikayil Mushfig Award, the Akif Samad Award, the Service to the Turkic World Award, the 25th anniversary medal of the World Young Turk Writers’ Union, the “Creative Woman of the Year” Award, the “Scientific Book of the Year” Award, the honorary decree of the AYB for scientific achievements in the field of philology, etc.
In general, do you think awards and public attention inspire a poet more, or do they give him a sense of inner comfort, even a silent sense of “completion”? In other words, when a person speaks his mind and receives its value, does this take him to new heights, or does it somehow force him to stop and pause?
-Award is always motivating as the highest manifestation of public attention. Isn’t all other efforts beyond writing a work just to get attention? All creative people need such attention. Of course, the right way is not to be satisfied with that attention, but to try to write better works with the artistic responsibility it gives rise to. Ensuring the continuity of success lies in this way.
You have also been communicating with young people in university auditoriums for many years. What does being a teacher mean to you – just transferring knowledge, or finding a way into the inner world of a young person, influencing their personality and future? During these years, have you felt yourself more in a position of teaching or learning?
-The first duty of a teacher is to transmit knowledge. You must teach the subject you teach in such a way that an image of each topic is created in the mind. Then knowledge works deep like a nail, and the winds of passing time cannot pull it out, erase it, or destroy it. When I say knowledge, I do not mean only teaching a lesson with a specific schematic program. I consider it important to skillfully melt and present the life lesson in the topic of that lesson, and to have a significant impact on the thinking of young people. I have always adhered to this condition in my teaching experience, and when I introduced the masterpieces of world literature to my students, I definitely included my philosophical view of the problems and characters, my attitude from the position of the highest moral values that come from the national genetic memory and are not outdated. I have always considered my students as my greatest wealth, a wealth that is constantly growing with the right investments.. I constantly tried to instill in them that the greatest happiness lies in spiritual comfort, and the importance of learning at a young age not to sacrifice one’s honor, conscience, and dignity for anything. To this day, I see the fruits of this in the countless student letters and messages I have received from all over the world.
Moreover, a teacher does not only influence his student with his speech, his behavior, how he finds solutions in various situations, his integrity of character, and his personality in general play an important role in determining the student’s life criteria. If a student sees his teacher’s helplessness in the form of flattery in front of someone higher in authority than him, if he observes his cowardice in certain situations, such as not being able to defend his position, then of course it is better not to learn from such a teacher… And we ourselves are constantly learning and developing in this teaching process. A good teacher should attach importance to gaining new knowledge in order to teach better than the previous one in each new academic year.
When teaching in the auditorium, do you draw a line between your teacher-poet-scientist identities? Or do these three roles intertwine and lead you to a different teaching style?
-Teacher, literary critic, scientist, poet… these are constantly intertwined in my work. I cannot imagine one of them in isolation from the other. I owe it to this “triad” for my image as a teacher, which has left an unforgettable impression on my students. Their unity in my work provides a good sense of difference. I think that this is also the reason why my students say things like “you also taught us a life lesson”, “we learned very important things about life from you”. When my student, who graduated 23 years ago, says “I wish I could listen to your lecture in that auditorium again”, there is a very important nuance that expresses this lofty wish.
I believe that the sieve of literature is very fair – time, readers and criticism will ultimately decide who will remain in eternity. But is it enough to write poetry alone today? What do you think a poet should do to remain in literary memory, keep poetry alive and carry it into the future?
-As you said, the sieve of time will separate the good from the bad. But sometimes there will be those who deceive time. There was such a sentence in one of the speeches of Ustad Seyran Sakhavat: “In the Soviet era, they created biographies for some writers.” And today everyone believes in that biography. Are there no so-called autobiographies, fake biographies today? They will convince them of the future. Can criticism always defend the position of true art? Criticism also appears among those who try to impose their so-called signatures on us as “writers” with their unnecessary scribbles. But let us hope that it is not criticism, but the artistic level of poetry that will ensure eternity. In spite of everything, it is necessary to write, to get acquainted with the achievements of world literary experience, with the innovations of the modern literary process, to learn and develop through mutual contacts. And remaining in memory should not be the poet’s plan, time will regulate it itself.
Readers have known you for years with your words. What would be your one-sentence, most sincere and heartfelt message to them? I would like to conclude our interview with that very sentence.
-Regardless of the environment, situation, or unexpected pressures of life, always be yourself, everywhere, and don’t let anything or anyone change you or bring you down from the spiritual highness within you.
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Interviewed by Aysel Nasirzade
