- Who was and what was the hero of Armenian literature of the 20th century?
- The hero of Armenian literature of the 20th century was the heir of the hero of Armenian literature of the 19th century. The artistic, philosophical abstract thought of the 19th century Armenian literature, endowed with a narodnik mission, called itself to enlighten and lead the nation. In Russia, to fight social scandals and save the Russian people, in us, to lead the national-liberation struggle. That literary-artistic, philosophical, social thought did not see reality as it was. He was gifted with a rescue mission and saw the reality as absolute darkness. The thing to be saved was the completely unenlightened, oppressed, suffering class, the oppressors in the case of Armenians were the Kurdish and Turkish beys, in Russia, the tsar and the nobles. In unique cases, people of unique genius, Tumanyan, Charents and others also noticed the error of their mission, because the reality had completely different manifestations than in their ideas of the apostles. Literature came for self-correction and attitude correction, and we have salvaged fragments that take us into the realms of world literature, real, great literature: "Towards the Infinite", "Anoush"... Compare the first version of "Anoush" with its social emphasis and the last version, which is a conversation with the infinite. "Depi Anhun", "Anoush", "Dantean" by Charents, "Khambapet Shavarsh", many pages of Bakunts became the saved pages of Armenian literature, which show who was, what was the hero of Armenian literature of the 20th century, how many losses we had due to apostolicism and what peaks we had as a result of self-correction.
- It was at the beginning of the century, and in the middle?
- In the middle of the century, literature, being called to become the side ornament of ideology and statehood, to be only the fictionalizer and embellisher of the great idea of Marxism-Leninism, finding a completely independent way with the first attempts, partially by instinct, in many cases and consciously, found its calling and retreated, retreated from its positions, because it continued its old mission of bringing new ideas to the masses through fiction. In the middle of the century, we also had saved authors, although again with huge losses, our literary thought actually lagged behind world literature. However, we again had names and works that are able to make up the strong volume that does not rank our literature among stillborn essays, but among living literatures. In the moments of difficult situations and heavy responsibilities, when you, the reader, want to create a textbook-Gospel for yourself from your Armenian language, in many cases you look at foreign literature, that's where the saving word comes from. Our honor, the honor of the national language and literature forces us to treat Armenian literature a little more lovingly and respectfully. I won't name names, but there is that big volume.
- Who was the hero of Armenian literature at the end of the 20th century? No matter how much we declare a crisis, literature existed, lived, books were both written and published. What did that literature bring to the reader, was it looking for itself or the reader? What and whose literature was it?
- Being honest, I have to say from my experience. the work that I thought would speak to time, now I see that, whether I like it or not, it already refers to the past, I'm afraid, even to the deep past. It is a literature born in a completely different alphabet than the alphabet of today's literature.
- What you said makes me think that today we have the same situation as at the beginning of the century: a country we don't know, a country whose artists have a fictitious but not real mission.
- The parallel with the beginning of the century is apparent, the similarity is superficial: war, fatal moments... The literature and reality of the beginning of the century was the true heir of its predecessor. The Communists adopted the same ideological mission. Writers had absolutely no new problem to master a new alphabet, to speak a new language with reality. They spoke the language of their predecessors. It was the same language of Pushkin, Nekrasov, Tumanyan, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Andreev, Gorky. There was no need for a new language. Today's Armenian writer is in an unprecedented situation.
- What is the writer's mission today?
– Time to create a language for reading. Very few of the writers of the past help the new writer to talk with today's reality in this case.
- What does "state order" of literature mean?
- It means that the state cannot stand alone without literature against this monster, like Stalin without Sholokhov, Khanjian without Charents, the American president without Faulkner.
- Still H. Tumanyan used to say, "There should be national protection for literature." What do we expect from writers and literature today?
- We demand a stable presence in our reality from our literature.
- As a reader, what do you want to read now?
- Positively charging book, that is, the deepest possible knowledge of reality. A book that encourages me, enlightens me in front of reality, gives me courage and light of mind. Insight of the gaze, a book to see today in historicity, not to be afraid of today and to rule your nation by itself.
- We regularly say: crisis of culture, crisis of art, crisis of literature. Finally, is it a partial crisis or a general social upheaval from which other retreats are derived?
- It is the crisis of public order and society in us, this is the state of a country trapped and defeated as a result of a heavy East-West struggle, and it will take a long time to come to its senses. But you can't say that the crisis has bypassed the winners.
- Any crisis, with its devastating effect, also has some positive, rational moment. When will we find that positive and when will we try to get out of the circle closed by our own hands with as few losses as possible? After all, what is our national ideology that should rid us of misunderstandings?
- These are difficult questions. Mainly on neither literary nor cultural grounds. National ideology rises from established phenomena of art and culture: architecture, music, singing, science, literature, which speak to man and shape society. Hakob Hakobyan expressed it wonderfully: remove the Government House building from the square, and the nation will disperse. The sum total of all this is the national ideology. In my opinion, Saryan's flowers and mountains, Tumanyan's "Anush", Charents' "Khambapet Shavarsh" are national ideology... And so-and-so, so-and-so deeds are not national ideology. Artistically accomplished work becomes national content.
- What should we do today to be a successful nation?
- We have many Teryans.
- But "The Coming Day of Armenian Literature" was written once in 100 years.
- Even if Vahan Teryan had not written a theory, the poems were already a national ideology. Nation building. Language was endowed with immortality.
- It always seemed to me that Teryan entered our history not so much with his poems, but with the new way of thinking, culture, psychology, and language he established. His presence in Armenian literature with his modern hero was a peaceful revolution, which was not understood at the time, perhaps not even today.
- Yes. Word by word, concept by concept, Teryan was drawn into Armenian literature and Armenian reality. He said that "it was perceived in its time, it is perceived today".
- In what relationship should literature and politics be, what is the reasonable version of the relationship?
- Literature will be literature, politics will be politics. If politics does not include literature, it means it is not the politics of this nation. If politics did not rise above its literature, its culture, it means either culture and literature are very poor, or politics is alien. Both were to be the substance of this society. Literature would be so rich that it would include all reality and have all the answers to reality, the politician would have to rise from that same society, you would have to put your Shakespeare in your Churchill.
- How should the isolation-islandization of Armenian literature from the course of world literature be overcome?
- What isolation? Or, insularization. From where?
- On the tree of world literature, our literature is a branch that, regardless of the patterns of nature, blooms when it wants, leaves or breaks when it wants, regardless of all other branches and roots.
- A little late, but we have also moved in step with each other.
- Then why are Armenian writers not among the recognized authors of world literature today?
- Armenian literature keeps its nation, its nation lives among all nations, what else do you want? Are you looking for Shakespeare?
- Today I am translating Joyce and I am not sure if any Irishman is translating any Armenian writer in his country. Why? What's more, Armenian writers are not inferior to Joyce and other famous figures of world literature in posing and solving problems. The problem is not the level, the recognition and acceptance, the demand in the world. Maybe the problem is to have a big and powerful country to accept a great writer.
- We are a part of European culture, there have been long periods of confrontation after the revolution, the ice of the Cold War has not yet melted. The standards of the unified, global culture are European, we have found ourselves in a part of the political situation. The political isolation formed as a result of ideological confrontation spread to culture as well. The same situation continues now.
- Modern means of technology can overcome this isolation. For example, which book of which Armenian writer is represented on the Internet? And on what principle?
- I would very much like that issue to be resolved at the state level and an editorial board of authoritative people would be created, which would determine which writer should enter the Internet for which purpose. And not just the writer. Armenian art, Armenian culture, Armenian scientist can and should have their choice on the Internet.
- The Internet can be a great way to overcome insularity and present our values to the world. Is it the problem of the Writers Union or the state?
- This is the problem of the Union of Writers with the support of the state. The concern of the government should be to strengthen its art for its stability, its power. At the beginning of the century, this work was done by individuals: they replaced the state with a Mantash and financed Tumanyan and Komitas, educated students in the centers of Russia and Europe, created a nation, strengthened themselves.
- Maybe it's my subjective feeling, but between your literature, which shaped the thinking and worldview of several generations of our Armenians, which, with the behavior of its heroes, makes people think, teaches to love and hate, to have memory and teeth, to fight and take revenge, and your image, which is manifested in interviews, public activities, calls people to kindness, tolerance, tranquility, to live in peace and harmony. Who is the real Hrant Matevossian?
- Perhaps there really was a breakthrough in me, and my speech took a completely different direction. We have all changed. It's time to change. The country has changed. Have you changed? The standard of genuineness has changed. The boundaries of the natural and the supernatural, the physical-metaphysical have shifted.
- Was your real grandfather Avetik or Ishkhan?
- I was going to write the second part of "Trees", where a third, unbiased person would retell the same events, where the scum would ally with the power, and they would not destroy each other, but would live together. I thought I would write it, connect it to the story and it would be a new novel, but what happened happened, and the reality that was inside me as a memory from the past did not become a text, and the horrible reality eliminated the need to retell the same. It is already necessary to talk about other things and we must be able to include everything that has happened, bring it into perspective, generalize and evaluate yesterday in order to find the starting points for today. Nothing more serious than in "Khambapet Shavarsh" or "Anoush" happens, but you come out not depressed, but smiling, because before your eyes is an invention of art, it's a miracle, you were present at a birth, not a death. The birth of art. Making reality into art. We need the joy of invention, the miracle of recognition...
- 60's almost all the writers, leaving the framework of the famous topic, either died or stopped writing, at least they did not remain the writer, the aesthetician who expressed the key words of the country, the people, the time. What happened and why?
- What often happens with my writers happened. What once happened to Tolstoy when he gave up art and switched to politics. There come times when it is immoral to deal with literature in the face of reality. The same thing happened to all of us. it was impossible to beautify literature any more in the face of this reality. Would Vano and Vazgen continue to write good stories, would Levon continue to decipher hieroglyphs? It was impossible. But we writers are a dying and rising people, as Saroyan says, we don't die once. So wait for our resurrection.
- What is your greatest desire as an Armenian writer today?
- The greatest desire of an Armenian writer is to have an Armenian reader. The only desire is to see the home of the Armenian reader bathed in warm light, to see himself at work, confident about tomorrow, with joy overflowing his face. To see freed from this environment of alienation-absorption.
- Should the Armenian writer or the Armenian reader take the first step?
- We will take the first step together. Alexander Myasnikyan and Yeghishe Charents were a charge for each other and were the power of the people, just as the people were theirs. On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the end of the Second World War, the American president noticed that America lived in seclusion, on its warm shores, armored by its oceans, and had no intention of interfering in European affairs, but Churchill appeared and, using all his knowledge of the Shakespearean language, dragged America into the war. It means that the presidents themselves and the society itself were so saturated with Shakespeare, they were so many sons of the same father that they found each other at once. This is the ideal state of the relationship between the state, society and their literature. And we are not far from that state.
Anahit ADAMIAN
"Republic of Armenia", 22.01.2000