Criticism and bibliography. Reviews Elista: Kalmyk State University Press, 2003, 536 p., ill. For the first time in Russia, a multilingual phrasebook and dictionary designed for small peoples, in particular for the Kalmyks, has been published. The Kalmyks are a people of Mongolian origin who have existed as part of the Mongol tribes for more than a millennium. The ancestors of the Kalmyks were the Oirats, who are mentioned in the "Hidden Legend of the Mongols" (XIII century), in "Altan Tobchi" (XVII-XVIII centuries) and in other Mongolian literary sources. Currently, the majority of Kalmyks live in Russia, in the Republic of Kalmykia (146 thousand), in Western Mongolia (150 thousand), in Kyrgyzstan, in the area of Lake Baikal. Issyk-Kul (approx. 5 thousand), in China, in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (160 thousand). These are the largest ethnic formations of the Kalmyks. Kalmyks live in small groups in Germany, France, and the Czech Republic. They settled in small diasporas in the United States, Australia, and Canada. Kalmyks have their own colorful national culture. So, in the XVII century. Zaya-Pandita Namkhayzhamtso, a scholar and educator of the Oirat-Kalmyk people, an outstanding translator who introduced Buddhism to the Kalmyk soil, created the Kalmyk script "Clear Writing"on the basis of the Mongolian and Manchu alphabets. In the XIX century, the world was discovered remarkable Kalmyk epic storytellers, creators of the heroic epic "Jangar", Buddhist poets. Among them, we can mention the rhapsod Eelyan Ovl, a singer of the Kalmyk heroic epic "Dzhangar", whose work is now recognized as the pinnacle of folk literature, or, for example, the satirical poet B. Bovaev. The Soviet era brought up a whole galaxy of representatives of Kalmyk culture and science. I would especially like to mention the outstanding Soviet poet D. N. Kugultinov, whose work was included in the golden fund of not only Kalmyk, but also all-Russian culture. Thus, the Kalmyk language has ... Читать далее