Summary
(On the occasion of 125th birth anniversary)
David V. Gasparyan
Inhumane treatment of the First Secretary of the Central Committee of Communist (Bolshevik) Party of Armenia Amatuni with Yeghishe Charents led to the death of the latter. During the work of A. Khanjian as the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the C(B)PA there was a question of sending the poet to Paris for treatment by the decision of the Zakkraikom. But the murder of Khanjian on July 9, 1936 turned everything upside down. It was believed that Charents was under the patronage of Khanjian, who was declared an enemy of the nation and was persecuted.
On November 16, 1936 the NKVD authorities decided to investigate the case of Charents, charged under the articles 67 and 68 of the Criminal Code of the Armenian SSR. He is accused of being one of the leaders of the anti-revolutionary, nationalist group of writers “November”. Charents categorically denies all charges, defends himself and gives explanations. From the same political positions, Charents was harshly criticized at the general meeting of Armenian writers on April 17-21, 1937.
Despite all this, in the last years of his life, the free creative element of Charents produced some great poetry, as well as works that show the real picture of
brutal political violence. In 1935-1937, Charents created more than in previous years. His creative life lasted 25 years – 1912-1937. The discovered pages of the works of those years are collected in three large volumes: “Unpublished and unfinished works” (1983), “Newly-appeared pages” (1996), “The Book of Remnants” (2017), to which new books can be added, because the unpublished pages of the poet’s oeuvre have not yet been fully studied. Each part of this heritage is a historical document of its time.
Hence, authorities come and go, but the spirit-creators, regardless of the official attitude towards them, come and stay. There was Pilate, who crucified Jesus Christ, and there was Amatuni, who sentenced Yeghishe Charents to death. The mythical power of the people’s faith resurrected Christ, and the genius of Charents, after 17 years (1937-1954) of prohibition, unveiled the unpublished legacy of the poet and made him a national heritage.