Nizami Museum of Azerbaijani Literature — Attraction in Baku City

Beautiful exterior. We entered through the wrong door initially, were then redirected. After walking through a metal detector manned by a guard preoccupied with his phone, the coat check stopped us, as that is where we were to buy our tickets. I asked for our tickets in Russian, they had told us they cost 7 monat each. After handing over a 20 note, they asked for our nationality. We had told them we are American, at which point they had upcharged us 10 monat each. After unhappily agreeing to the price, they had asked us to cover our shoes with plastic booties, surrender our hand bags, as well as given instructions on our mobile phone usage. I became annoyed by the upsale then being ordered around on petty matters before seeing anything, so I asked for a refund, to which they obliged. I had heard wonderful things about Azeri literature and hoped to learn more at this museum. Nothing more than a curiosity for my education. Unfortunately, I was greeted with an upcharge and a string of commands...

The museum is quite old-style. There's one permanent exhibition which, according to the guide, changes slightly when new exhibits arrive. But it mostly comprises of the Soviet-era portraits of the premodern national poets and the personal items of the later writers. The exhibition's structure is chronological and there's hardly any concept behind the composition. You can feel the top-down approach imposed by the museum's leadership already at the entrance. They tend to control each movement of visitors with time limitations and mandatory guides. The staff at the cloak room were sarcastic towards my critical remarks and lacked professionalism, but the guide was helpful. You can visit if you're particularly interested in the topic. Otherwise, the building of the museum is much...

Super interesting museum, the guide was so intelligent and nice, I wish I could listen more and more, but you have only one hour inside and no photos allowed. But I don’t care about photos. I want to explore exposition, but you must go further cuz your time limited. So sad. I want to pay more and listen more, and watch all books and stuff. A lot of people inside and they only work is to switch off the lights after you’ll left the room. Please, make more options to visit this place, one hour it’s not...