He was a man free of flaws of spirit, body and mind—and therefore free of any secret or open effort to conceal a flaw. Decades of power and the passing years could not undermine this rare human structure: power through an arrogant bearing, age through an old man’s timidity, the inescapable fear of the end of his share of the world, and the greed and bitterness born of that fear, which fill old men’s mouths with curses.
Demirchyan grew older, but he did not grow old. The failings of old men and those who had left the public stage thus awaited him decades away—or perhaps did not await him at all, for he was made of a rare alloy.
In Karen Demirchyan, for all of us—and, if you wish, for the whole world—we had found the best possible answer to a deeply felt need, an answer with no alternative among us today. He was an exceptional gift to our scattered, bewildered advance, and only an enemy’s eye would have seen that this man must be eliminated, surrendering that advance once again to waves of panic, confusion, mistrust and anxiety.
His mere presence helped us gather ourselves and rediscover who we were: the sons of yesterday’s great and kindly homeland, broad-minded, fearless, decent, full of tenderness and innocent love for the world, for one another and for ourselves. The horizons that weigh so heavily upon us today receded before our steps, and time and the world opened wide. For in the beginning was the human being, and Karen Demirchyan’s presence helped us find that noble, upright human being within ourselves.