The article describes the genre features and historical significance of the First President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev’s work "The Epoch of Independence." After having analyzed domestic and foreign scholars’ views on the literary genre, the author comes to the conclusion that N. Nazarbayev’s work is a memoir. Studying the requirements for memoirs and genre features, he has given some examples from the work.

A genre of memoir, depending on various characteristics, such as its performance form, linguistic-stylistic features,the author's narration, sources and other types, is divided into memoir- feature article and memoir-essay. The author pays more attention to them.

Much attention will be paid to the discussion of such issues as the artistic- compositional structure of his work and N. Nazarbayev’s authorship.

The memorial work is based on the source and carried out in a journalistic style, therefore its historical significance is unusual. The author emphasizes the historical and educational significance of N. Nazarbayev’s work. The author evaluates the First State Head’s memorial work from his own experience as a valuable source in the history of Independent Kazakhstan.