Altan Ovoo

Altan Ovoo

Regular price
Sold out
Sale price
$20.00

G.Mend-Ooyo’s Altan Ovoo, originally written at the end of the 1980s, holds an unusual place in world literature. It is not fiction, although it contains stories; it is not poetry, although it contains poems; nor, even though it deals primarily with the history and culture of the author’s birthplace of Sühbaatar province in southeastern Mongolia, does it really qualify either as history or as folklore. Mend-Ooyo himself describes the work as an “almanac,” an omnium gatherum of stories and poems, changing slightly with each revision of the book, and presenting as much the idea of Mongolian nomadic culture as its lived experience.