Nikolai Egorovich Mordinov

(pseudonym, Amma Achchygyia). Born Dec. 24, 1905 (Jan. 6, 1906), in the Nizhniaia Amga nasleg (village council), Boturussk ulus (district), presentday Yakut ASSR. Soviet Yakut writer. People’s Writer of the Yakut ASSR (1966).

Mordinov was the son of a peasant. He graduated from the pedagogical department of the Second Moscow State University in 1931. He was first published in 1927.

Mordinov’s first collection of stories, The Knife Does Not Cut the Handle, appeared in 1934. He is the author of the novellas On Vacation (1937), Insult (1939), Friends (1947), and Calamity (1961–62). Mordinov’s most important work was the novel Springtime (1944; Russian translation, 1958), which depicts the Yakuts’ struggle for a new life. His play Along the Broad Road (1964) is devoted to those who are developing the country’s mineral wealth.

Mordinov has translated the works of M. lu. Lermontov, L. N. Tolstoy, V. G. Korolenko, and other authors into Yakut. He served as a deputy to the seventh convocation of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. He has been awarded four orders.