Children\'s Literature

Likewise other areas of the literature the basis of children\'s literature based on children\'s folklore (mainly tales, lullabies, okhshama and others). However, the creation of a professional children\'s literature in Azerbaijan dates back to the beginning of the XX century. 

From the early twentieth century there was a revival in the field of education and culture:  a number of educational institutions, charitable societies, publishing houses, libraries have been created. 

Writers dealing with the children\'s literature used to publish own works in the pages of textbooks for new stylized schools, in all the periodical press, especially in the periodical children\'s press. New styled schools rose as an urgent issue creation of new content and textbooks. N. Narimanov that made courageous steps in this area still in 1899 had written a book Brief description of Turk-Azerbaijan language ,and narrated about stable literary language and common spelling rules. He was also in initiative to publish together with S.M.Qanizade Sovqat (1896) illustrated children\'s magazine and School (1900) monthly scientific-pedagogical magazine. R.B.Efendiyev also created original and translated works, materials on geography, historical events and structure of the universe basing on  unity of training and upbringing  in the book   Kindergarten (1898) (training of K.D.Ushinski – Q.N.). Geography, historical events and materials provided on the structure of the universe. In textbooks used as the perfect means for a long time (the first year, Second year; Third year) the best samples of the national children\'s literature or translated literature had been collected. Besides it in A.Shaiq’s Child eye, Gulzar, textbooks, in two-part Mother Tongue, etc. textbooks prepared by teachers of Irevan and published in Tbilisi examples of children\'s literature with new content were collected. During these years the periodicals distributed in all parts of country began to shine “As the stars from the cloud (Mir Jalal). 

S.S.Akhundov wrote the Fearful stories for “The school magazine. These stories published consistently from 1912 to 1914 are read with great pleasure by children as well as parents, and impatiently waited for its continuation.  

When M.A.Sabir was a teacher in Shamakhy and Baku schools he felt the poorness of children\'s literature and he wrote poetry in different themes. This works consist of moralizing stories and didactic poetry, school songs and as well as fables. 

M.A.Sabir’s Children and ice, School fair, Inclination to school, Inclination to Science also remembered for a long time for its content, according to the nature of artistic expression. Poet narrates in these songs about benefit of school, science, achieving of bright days with unity of science and man, service to motherland, people. He wrote these songs in the beginning of functioning of new styled schools. In these poems the call for the school, the science is strong enough. Enlightening realists prepare educational textbooks and manuals, pay more attention to their training and education, and directs their creativity in this direction. There are more narrations in their works of art about the tragic, hard life of children, their hopes and wishes. The contributions of this kind of realist enlightenment writers like R. Efendiyev, S.S.Akhundov, A. Shaig, I.Musabeyov, S.M.Qanizade are exceptional. Their literary and artistic creative completed teaching ideas and views directly related to school. Likewise they have a great self-sacrifice for the sake of their new school; they also demonstrated a great activity in preparation of school program, textbooks and teaching aids, selection of taught works with care. They paid special attention to the content of works taught and caused citizenship and patriotism feelings in children\'s minds. S.S.Akhundov in all his literary and pedagogical activity thought about the fate of young generation and their future, and narrated about their life as a citizen-writer and teacher. 

S.S.Akhundov along with large-scale plays wrote short stories about the lives of children, “Memories of childhood life and finally Fearful stories. Fearful stories consisted of Ahmed and Maleyka, Abbas and Zeynab; Ashraf, Nureddin and Gypsy girl resulted from the poor life of Azerbaijani families before the revolution, tragic life of children, the reasons leading to this disaster. Environment, social conditions deprives  the innocent children from care, and dropped them in the dark corner of the life. 

A.Shaig also like S.S.Akhundov. M.A.Sabir fought for the same idea and shown unprecedented service in creation of realistic literature of the XX century. Shaiq known in our literature as poet, prose writer, playwright, also was known as the folk teacher, famous pedagogue and public figure. 

A.Shaiq became popular in literature due to his contributions in children\'s literature. The first period of literary activity of A.Shaiq is associated with children\'s Literature. Since 1906 he began to write a short, clear content, the new contented, fast rhymed poems for young schoolchildren. The main theme of these poems was the animal world. Here, first of all poultry and domestic animals (Cock, Goat, Children and rabbits, Orphan chicken, Tapal kalim” , Rabbit, Bird, Lamb and etc.) turned into new images of amusement of children in works of the poet. It was natural that the poet applied to the world of animals often. Thus, children usually show interest in life of animals, like to play with them, to be in contact with them, to attract them to own games. Being well aware of village life A. Shaig had described domestic animals with their individual behavior and attributes. 

Complex historical events during the reaction years caused various echoes in the creation of A.Sahhat. 

The children works of the poet were a new event in history of Azerbaijan with its sincerity and nature. Lyric poems, stories in verse, songs, fables, and plays, translations from Russian and Western literature showed that A.Sahhat was deeply familiar with the literature of children. In poems Father and son, Mother and child, Mother and Child, Two children, School pupil, Lazy  A. Sahhat, first of all invited children to school, education, science. He expresses it as the result of natural feeling of children. 

During the first formation years two generations took part in the creation of children prose. The first generation’s representatives are those started the creativity before the revolution, like J.Mammadguluzade, A. Hagverdiyev, S.S.Akhundov, A. Shaig, T.Shahbazi, J. Jabbarli, S. Hussein, and others with a rich literary experience. These writers besides being loyal to their own creative, demonstrated tendency towards new topics, and tried to settle them in view of requirements of new life. 

J. Mammadguluzadeh in his Two apples story described a human nature feeling of minor child. 

 S.S.Akhundov took the themes of his Blood spring (1923), Lamp of Hope (1923), A victim of ignorance (1923), Child murderer (1924), Why (1925) from the pre-revolution dark environment. 

It should be noted that the very complex and rich literature process of XX century although is different in style, but in content it stands in same position of upbringing of new generation, getting education, knowledge and inclination to innovative ideas and had the same mission. It is interesting that women writers gave more places in their creativity for education of young children. 

To express the idea suitable to the level of the children in interesting and compact form, in live boards are the peculiar qualities of the creativity of N. Suleymanov and B. Hasanov. They describe vital events in accordance with the requirements and aesthetic tastes of little aged pupils in modern themes. The same words can be said about A.Ahmedov’s and I. Hummatov’s stories, poetry of T. Elchin, F. Sadıkhi, Z. Khalil and others. The technical discoveries of our century also gave an impetus to the creation of fantastic publications. E. Mahmudov, N. Abdullayev wrote interesting works on the development of science, technology and description of tomorrow. Of course, the creators of children’s literature are not limited to the names of the writers that we listed. In recent years the number of writers having trend in children\'s literature has increased significantly. They stay loyal to the literary tradition and try to be distinguished with its own direction and style, to create beautiful new works. Our modern children\'s literature had been developed on the basis of its rich traditions, enriched by new properties.