Chadraabalyn Lodoidamba

Tschadraabalyn Lodoidamba ( Mongolian Чадраабалын Лодойдамба ; * 1917 , † January 11, 1969 ) was a Mongolian writer and playwright.

Life

Lodoidamba was born the son of a cattle herder known as a folk teller who introduced the boys to the traditions of Mongolian folklore . He was placed in a monastery as a child, from which he later fled. After attending school in Ulan Bator , he graduated from the workers' faculty in Ulan-Ude (Buryatia / Russia), in 1954 he completed a degree in Mongolian language and literature at the state university and in 1959 an aspirant degree in Moscow , where he received his doctorate in art studies.

Lodoidamba was chairman of the Afro-Asian Solidarity Committee of the Mongolian People's Republic and from 1962 until his death deputy minister of culture.

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Lodoidamba became known with his stories "The Wolf with the Cap" (1944) and "Who's to blame?" (1947) as well as the extensive story "Im Altai" (1949/51), which used to be classified as a novel. These works are among the very few prose works of the "dark years" (the rule of Choibalsan from 1937/38 to 1952) that have survived to this day. This was followed by the stories "Our School" (1952) and "Unbroken" (1959), in which the main character, despite political denunciation, finds the inner strength to go on living and to stand up for justice. In the story "Solongo" (1958/65, German 1976) Lodoidamba sensitively describes the first love between a girl and the first-person narrator. Later stories such as "My Acquaintances" (as a volume in 1962) and "Tschuluun" (1965) also enriched the Mongolian literature of those years.

Lodoidamba's main work is the two-volume novel "Der transparent Tamir" (1962/67, German 1978), dedicated to the memory of his father. It is the "Mongolian answer" to the " Silent Don ", the great novel by the Soviet Nobel Prize winner for literature Mikhail Scholokhov , applies. This work, which has long been considered the most important Mongolian novel and has been translated into several languages, owes its lasting success to the multi-layered plot that spanned over twenty years, the psychological penetration of the main characters and its stylistic qualities, which unfortunately in the German translation from Russian not always be clear.

Lodoidamba also emerged as a playwright who mainly drew from everyday life and was successful with comedies such as “You can believe me” (1961) and “One may hope” (1962).

Translations

• in: Explorations. 20 Mongolian stories, (East) Berlin 1976
• Tschadraabalyn Lodoidamba, Der transparent Tamir, (East) Berlin 1978

literature

• in: Klaus Oehmichen, Ten Mongolian Poets, Mongolian Notes, issue 17/2008

Mongolian name: As is customary in Mongolia, in this article the patronymic is in the genitive case before the proper name. Thus Tschadraabal is the patronymic, Lodoidamba the proper name. The person is addressed with their proper name.