(12.12.1931 – 23.10.1991)

Ahmedkhan Abu-Bakar was a writer, publicist, screenwriter and the first Dargin playwright. He graduated from the Maxim Gorky Literary Institute and completed screenwriting courses in Moscow. During his sixty-year life, he created a diverse body of literary and cinematic works.

His first works were published in the newspaper Kolkhoz Banner (1949) and in the Dargin edition of the Friendship almanac. In 1954, his first collection of poems in his native language, Zarevo, was published. His best-known novella, The Dargin Girls, was translated into Russian, French, English, Spanish and Polish. His drama People in Burkas explores the hardships faced by his people. For children, Abu-Bakar wrote the collection of stories Grandfather Khabibulla from the Valley of Gardens and the play Nur-Eddin – the Golden Hands.

The first of twelve films based on his screenplays was The Clouds Are Leaving the Sky, while the last, which the writer did not live to see released, was The Secret of the Handwritten Quran. For his contribution to the development and popularisation of the Dargin language and literature, Ahmedkhan Abu-Bakar was honoured with the title “People’s Writer of Dagestan.”

The monument was created by one of Geybat Geybatov’s students, Honoured Artist of Dagestan Shamil Kanaygadzhiev, who also teaches at the Faculty of Arts and Graphics of Dagestan State University. Kanaygadzhiev was one of the sculptors who created the monumental statue of Rasul Gamzatov in Moscow to mark the 90th anniversary of the poet’s birth in 2013.

Works by the talented sculptor can also be seen in Makhachkala, the capital of Dagestan. These include the bronze fish figures in the city’s large fountain, statues of Leo Tolstoy and Hadji Murat, the hero of his eponymous novella, and the memorial to the People’s Poet of Dagestan, Yusup Khappalayev.