[Light in the prairie] Svet v stepi / Teyegin Gerl. #1 1968. Kalmyk almanac signed by Kalmyk female poet.

Kalmyk almanac signed by Kalmyk female poet. 

[Light in the prairie] Svet v stepi / Teyegin Gerl. #1 1968.

Elista: Kalmyk Book Publishing, 1968. 8vo (260 x 200 mm); 76 pp, illustrated. In Kalmyk and Russian.

In the publisher’s illustrated wrappers; lightly creased, chipped and rubbed. Pencil markings on the back wrapper, light stains. Inscribed by editor on the title page. Overall in good condition. 

2100 copies printed. 

Inscribed by editor: To Sasha, as a keepsake from the editor - B. Sangadzhieva. 30/V-68.     

The first Kalmyk literary almanac, published from 1957 and to this day. It was a successor to Kalmyk journals Мана келн and Улан туг, and was published in an extremely small capacity for the Soviet standards. There were more than 106 000 Kalmyk people living in the Soviet Union. 

Kalmyk are the only Mongolian people, as well as the only traditionally Buddhist ethnic group who are located inside Europe.

In 1943 more than 90000 people of Kalmyk nationality were deported into Siberia to perform forced labor, the act known as Operation Ulusy. The government's official reasoning for the deportation was an accusation of Axis collaboration (Kalmykian Cavalry Corps), disregarding the fact that there were noticeably more Kalmyk people fighting in the Red Army at the same time. Улан туг, the only Kalmyk journal existing at the time, was closed.

The Kalmyks were only allowed to leave their Siberian settlements in 1957, after they were rehabilitated, and their home region was formalized as the Kalmyk Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic. The Teyegin Gerl literary almanach was created the same year.

The copy inscribed by the chief editor of the journal, a poet, and a member of the Soviet Writers Union Bosi Sangadzhieva (1921-2001), addressed to poet Alexander Govorov (1938-2010). After her return from Siberia, Bosi Sangadzhieva worked as an editor in Kalmyk Book Publishing in Elista, where she published her own poems and her translations of famous Russian poems into Kalmyk language.

We couldn’t trace any copy of this edition in USA or European libraries via OCLC.