To the history of the publication of Persian authors in “world literature”: “Shahnameh” by Firdousi (based on archival materials). Part 1

The article is devoted to a plot related to the discussion of the possibility of publishing the Persian epic “Shahnameh” in the “World Literature” - the first publishing house of translated literature of early Soviet Russia. Based on the material of documents from the Archive of A. M. Gorky IWL RAS (A. N. Tikhonov’s Foundation), the chronology of the activities of the Eastern Board of the Publishing House devoted to the stages of consideration of proposals for the translation and publication of the epic of Firdousi. In the first part of the article, based on archival sources, the history of the Eastern College of “World Literature” is reconstructed, the goals and objectives of this department are highlighted, as well as the activities devoted to the development of rules for the translation of Oriental authors. The article also reconstructs the history of the consideration of S. I. Sokolov’s proposal to give an anthological translation of the “Shahnameh”, the approach of which was ambiguously evaluated by other members of the Eastern Collegium: S. F. Oldenburg, N. Ya. Marr, I. Yu. Krachkovsky. As a result, the author comes to the conclusion that the Moscow orientalist S. I. Sokolov was largely helped by his perseverance and willingness to cooperate with the “World Literature”, despite criticism of his work by prominent orientalists. At the same time, an invaluable contribution to the history of the publication of “Shahnameh” was made by the review of F. A. Rosenberg, who highly appreciated Sokolov’s merits in not only translation, but also poetic activity, showing the Moscow employee of “World Literature” as one of the few orientalists able to properly translate the multi-page epic of Firdousi.