[1] Aitmatov lived at a time when Kyrgyzstan was being transformed from one of the most remote lands of the Russian Empire to a republic of the USSR.

He later held jobs as a tax collector, a loader, and an engineer's assistant and continued with many other types of work.

[9] On 16 May 2008, Aitmatov was admitted with kidney failure to a hospital in Nuremberg, Germany, where he died of pneumonia on 10 June 2008 at the age of 79.

Aitmatov's first two publications appeared in 1952 in Russian: "Газетчик Дзюйо" ("The Newspaper Boy Dziuio") and "Ашым" ("Ashim").

Seen through the eyes of an adolescent boy, it tells of how Jamila, a village girl, separated from her soldier husband by the war, falls in love with a disabled former soldier staying in their village as they all work to bring in and transport the grain crop.

His work drew on folklore, not in the ancient sense of it; rather, he tried to recreate and synthesize oral tales in the context of contemporary life.

[1] In The Day Lasts More Than a Hundred Years, a poetic legend about a young captive turned into a "mankurt" serves as a tragic allegory and becomes a significant symbolic expression of the philosophy of the novel.

Although the short story touches on the idea of friendship and loyalty between a man and his stallion, it also serves a tragic allegory of the political and USSR government.

It explores the loss and grief that many Kyrgyz faced through the protagonist character in the short story.

[citation needed] A second aspect of Aitmatov's writing is his ultimate closeness to our "little brothers" the animals, for their and our lives are intimately and inseparably connected.

In 1963, Aitmatov was honored with the Lenin Prize for the compilation "Повести гор и степей" (the title translates into English "Tales of the Mountains and Steppes") which had been published earlier that same year containing the four novels "Джамиля" (Jamila), "Тополек мой в красной косынке" (To Have and to Lose), "Верблюжий глаз" (Camel's Eye) and "Первый учитель" (Duishen / The First Teacher).