Interlocking Autobiographies Dialogical Techniques in Fakhreddinov’s Āthār III

Athar III is the third volume of a Tatar-language biographical dictionary written by the Islamic scholar and historian Rizaeddin bin Fakhreddin (Fakhreddinov, d. 1936). This third volume was not published during his lifetime, and Fakhreddinov continued to work on it up until the mid-1930s, when he was Mufti of Soviet Russia. The chapter focuses on Fakhreddinov's integration of testimonies by his colleagues, in particular his friend (and predecessor in the Mufti's chair) Alimjan Barudi (d. 1921). The dialogues that Fakhreddinov reproduced in this manuscript reveal their common interest in Islamic reform, but also some tensions between them when it comes to the role of the biographer.