Layla and Majnun by Alisher Navoi in E.E. Bertels's interpretation

The paper focuses on the approaches to the identification of the national and writer's identity of Persian poets Nizami Ganjavi (1141-1211), Amir Khusrow Dehlavl (1253-1325) and the Turkic poet Alisher Navoi (1441-1501) basing on the works on poems named Layla and Majnun by E.E. Bertels, the leading Soviet orientalist of the first half of the 20th century. Particular attention is paid to E.E. Bertels's efforts to restore the reputation of the Uzbek classic Alisher Navoi as of the original author, opposing to the European tradition of Orientalism, according to which Navoi was just a translator. The author introduces some adjustments related to the specificity of Muslim culture into E.E. Bertels's ideas about the deepening of realism and psychological depth in Navoi's poem.

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