Semushkin, T[ikhon Zakharovich], author; K.N. Dabin, translator; V. A. Kustov, illustrations.

[SOVIET COLONIALISM AND INDIGENOUS LANGUAGES – CHILDREN’S BOOK IN THE KHANTY LANGUAGE] Taleko pa tuv pattapty lilitl. Taleko i ego khrabryi lilit [Taleko and his brave Lilit].

Leningrad: Uchpedgiz, 1951. Octavo (22.4 × 16.9 cm). Original quarter-cloth over illustrated boards; 62, [2] pp. In Khanty and Russian. Illustrated with nine small black and white drawings in the text. Small inventory number stamp to title, not from a library. Light soil to wrappers; corners lightly bumped; still very good. Item #55865

Printed in the Khanty language in the Cyrillic alphabet, this children’s book tells the story of ten-year-old boy Taleko, who along with his dog Lilit gets stranded on an ice sheet that drifts out to sea. A Soviet aviator locates the boy and drops provisions for him until the rescue team is able to complete the rescue operation. The story, typical of the “white savior” myth propagated in this period by Soviet and Western governments alike, was written by the Soviet writer and teacher Tikhon Semushkin (1900–1970). Trained as a teacher but pining for northern exploration, Semushkin participated in numerous Soviet expeditions to the Chukotka Peninsula (Bering Strait) in the 1920s and 1930s, experiences on which he drew for literary works such as this one. He also participated in the development of the Chukchi language writing system, part of a team led by the ethnographer and linguist Vladimir Bogoraz. In 1928 Semushkin became the first director of a new boarding school for Chukchi children in the village of Lavrentievo, part of a controversial program of the Soviet government of taking children from their families to educate them in parallel in the Chukchi and Russian language, as well as in Soviet political ideology. Similar boarding schools were opened for the Khanty children, in the Khanty-Mansy autonomous district in Eastern Siberia, where the present volume, translated into the Khanty language, was likely used. The establishment of Soviet boarding schools for children of ethnic minorities as well as the forced collectivization of the Khanty people led to local resistance known as the Kazym Rebellion in 1933. This story was originally published in Russian and in the Yupik and Nanai languages in 1948. One of 1000 copies.

As of August 2026, this Khanty language edition is not in KVK, OCLC, which show three libraries worldwide with holdings of this title in the Yupik and Nanai languages.

Price: €650.00

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