. . . this ambitious interdisciplinary study, which also has the virtues of being methodologically rigorous and ideologically unbiased, enriches the debate on the Kazakh nation with an argument strongly grounded in the interpretation of texts. Kudaibergenova’s book represents a clear and concise work that contributes to debates on nation-building in the post-Soviet context and discussions on Soviet totalitarianism, imperialism and postcolonialism. In this regard, it prepares the field for further research on the other republics of the former Soviet Union or other postcolonial contexts.

Europe-Asia Studies

Kudaibergenova’s project is highly ambitious and covers an impressive breadth of literary history . . . This book accomplishes its primary aim, which is to provide a welcome and needed view into the lives and worlds of twentieth-century writers in Kazakhstan, and will be helpful for scholars of (post-)Soviet literature and nationalisms alike.

Central Asian Survey

As Kazakhstan undergoes a Kazakh literature revival nearly 30 years after its independence in 1991, the book is a timely and valuable way for readers to become more familiar with the dynamism of the Kazakh cultural landscape over the past 100 years.

AramCo World

Diana T. Kudaibergenova has written an important book that introduces modern Kazakh literature and issues of Kazakh identity to English-language audiences. She accomplishes this through a careful analysis of selected major works of Kazakh belles lettres. Her study provides a cogent analysis of the relation of works of successive generations of writers to one another and to the political context in which they worked. Readers of this book will be rewarded with an understanding of how Kazakh literati have conceived of and portrayed the history of the Kazakh people and its relevance to the eras in which they wrote. Dr. Kudaibergenova leads the reader up to the present and illustrates the complexity of Kazakhs’ and Kazakhstan’s identity in the post-Soviet era.

William Fierman, Indiana University Bloomington

Impressively applying methods of cultural semiotics and the sociology of culture, Diana T. Kudaibergenova approaches the ideologies that have been accompanying the complex transformations of Kazakh national identity in a non-ideological manner, combining intimate familiarity with her subject with an objective perspective throughout. This renders her monograph a groundbreaking contribution to the study of modern Kazakh society, particularly regarding the ways in which literary texts shaped national discourses during the Soviet and post-Soviet periods.

Peter Rollberg, George Washington University

Rewriting the Nation in Modern Kazakh Literature offers a rare glimpse into the world of the ‘writers of the nation’ who, in pursuit of their elitist projects, shaped ‘total readership’ in Soviet Kazakhstan and inscribed the ideals of indigenous history and nationhood. While focused on research and mythology involved in these Soviet projects, it speaks volumes to broader issues and provides important insights to academic debates on totalitarianism, post-colonialism, and national imagination.

Saulesh Yessenova, University of Calgary