Even Literature

Even Literature 

the literature of the Evens, or Lamut, a people living in Yakutia, in Magadan and Kamchatka oblasts, and in Khabarovsk Krai. Before Soviet power was established, Even literature existed only in the form of a rich oral tradition. In the early 1930’s the first Even authors emerged among the students of the Leningrad Institute of the Peoples of the North. They were N. S. Tarabukin (1910–50), from Yakutia, and A. A. Cherkanov (born 1918), from Kamchatka. Tarabukin’s collections, published in Even with a Russian parallel translation, include Songs of the Taiga (1936) and The Flight of the Golden Girl (1937); his autobiographical novella My Childhood (1936) also achieved popularity. Cherkanov is the author of the collection of poems Hot Springs (1937).

P. Lamutskii (real name, P. A. Stepanov [born 1920]), an expert on Yakut folklore, published collections of poems in the Yakut and Even languages, such as Song of the Even (1962) and The Old Man’s Children (1970). Other noted writers in Yakutia include the Even poets D. E. Edukin (born 1931), V. S. Keimetinov (born 1936), and A. E. Nikulin (born 1937). The prominent Even poet V. D. Lebedev (born 1934) has written articles on language and folklore. Works by Even writers have been translated into various languages of the USSR.

TEXTS AND REFERENCES

Evenskii fol’klor. [Introductory article by K. A. Novikova.] Magadan, 1958.
Ot Moskvy do taigi odna nochevka: Sb. Moscow-Leningrad, 1961.
Pisateli Iakutii. Yakutsk, 1972.

M. G. VOSKOBOINIKOV