2010 is Year of Germany in Kazakhstan

Semey, January 20, 2009, Khabar – 2010 was announced as the year of Germany in Kazakhstan. There is a place in the Abai museum in Semey which is dedicated to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, an outstanding German poet, thinker, and one of the founders of German literature. This was a present to Kazakh people by the German town of Ilmenau where the Goethe museum is located. Goethe wrote his most well-known “Wanderer’s Nightsong” poem 230 years ago in Ilmenau. Who would have thought at that time that this work by the German poet will tie three great names such as Goethe, Lermontov and Abai together. In 1840 Mikhail Lermontov translated the poem into Russian and called it “Mountain tops are sleeping in the darkness of night”. 25 years later, composer Rubinstein wrote a long song basing on this poem. And 25 more years later, this love song impressed Kazakh poet Abai.

Maiken Zhunusova, deputy director, Abai Republican Literature and Memorial Complex:
- While comparing these three works, a wonderful scholar and writer Gerold Belger wrote that Goethe created a static picture of a night scene whereas Lermontov brought life to it and Abai excelled them both by showing the motion of the nightfall.

According to literary critics, Abai managed to introduce various cultures to Kazakh traditions.

Maiken Zhunusova, deputy director, Abai Republican Literature and Memorial Complex:
- He decided to take Abai’s version of “Wanderer’s Nightsong” poem to Germany and tell German readers about this amazing poetic thread of Goethe, Lermontov and Abai. He was able to fulfill this idea in 1979 when he brought a marble slap with a text carved in it which was a song to Abai’s poem performed by Zhusupbek Yelebekov.

It is planned to hold a literary soiree during the year of Germany in Kazakhstan. So this is how one poem tied two nations together and forever.