In Daily Sabah Kaya Genç reports that Filled with surprises, Baku's literary scene awaits discovery -- with a focus on a visit to the Nizami Museum of Azerbaijani Literature.
The museum is certainly housed in an impressive building -- though it is perhaps not entirely tourist-friendly:
The museum is certainly housed in an impressive building -- though it is perhaps not entirely tourist-friendly:
A guide is appointed to you, irrespective of your desire. You have exactly one hour to visit more than 30 rooms in the building with your guide, who talks about biographies of authors in Azeri, following you wherever you go. The lights in the museum halls are only turned on when you enter them. No cellular phones are allowed inside the building.As to the modern Azeri literary scene, the endorsement isn't exactly ringing:
"Writers of my generation are kind of lazy," Efendi told me. "The number of high quality literary works is not high.Nevertheless, it would be great to see more Azeri works available in English -- they certainly lag behind, for example, Georgia, which has been putting a lot of effort into getting its literature out (and will be Guest of Honour at the Frankfurt Book Fair in a couple of years); see also the index of Georgian literature under review at the complete review.