Dedicated to the 150th Anniversary of His Birth
Marie Rose Abousefian Ph.D
October 24, 2025 | San Francisco
“I must enter our life like a comet,
I must sing, preach, struggle, weep, and burn…”
Avetik Isahakyan
It is a rare occurrence for the poet of a small nation to stay alive in the hearts of his people for 150 years, to become part of their daily existence, a song they sing, an awakening alarm in moments of decay, a comfort to grieving mothers who have lost their sons, and a resounding echo of victory in times of downfall.
Our nation is among the fortunate ones, blessed with such exceptional talents whose millennia and centuries follow one another: Narekatsi, Kuchak, Sayat-Nova, Tumanyan, Komitas, Terian, Isahakyan, Varoujan, Siamanto, and many others. Their works remain enduringly present.
By a remarkable coincidence and with a certain inner meaning, the 150th anniversary of the birth of our great poet, philosopher, national figure, translator, academician, and laureate of state prizes, Avetik Isahakyan, has fallen in a difficult period of our nation’s history. His life is intertwined with the trials of his country’s and people’s survival, and today the celebration of his jubilee once again affirms his enduring bond with his nation and homeland.
Under different circumstances, with true national statehood, this jubilee would certainly have been celebrated with great solemnity as in the past. Yet today, when our country is deprived of its national governance, I consider it my duty to convey, through this brief writing, my profound gratitude and love for our great poet, whose patriotism nourished and inspired us, and whose foresight we now see coming to life.
Throughout his life, from the late 19th century through the 20th century, Isahakyan lived in various countries and witnessed different political eras, particularly times of crisis for his people. Always restless, he remained deeply concerned for his nation and homeland until his final days. Unable to endure the longing for his native land, he returned home during the most difficult period and, through his influence, he became the stronghold of Armenian spiritual life and the guardian of the Armenian language, guiding his people both in the homeland and abroad. He shaped an entire generation of patriots.
He became a symbol of patriotism, and it might have seemed that with the hundreds of commentaries and words of praise from Armenian and foreign luminaries, and academic publications, interest in his name and legacy would eventually fade. Yet, in the 21st century, his 150th anniversary, along with the prophetic power of his words, “I tell you, the famine of the soul will come”, which so strikingly reflects the present state today’s world, reaffirms his wisdom, unique talent, profound philosophy, and the boundless love his people hold for him.
On October 30, 1875, on the banks of the Akhuryan River in the village of Ghazarapat (near Alexandropol, now Gyumri), Avetik, the seventh child of Sahak and Almast Isahakyan, was born. He enjoyed a happy and carefree childhood, enjoying the beauty of Mount Aragats (Alagyaz) and the vast fields surrounding it. “Beloved Shirak has been the center of the universe for me, for it is here that my heart first began to beat”, he wrote.
His father owned a watermill inherited from his own father, which provided the family with a comfortable living. Avetik received his primary education at the local parish school, but in 1885, when Armenian schools were closed by order of the Tsarist government, he was forced to continue his studies at a city school where all lessons were in Russian, except for religion, which was taught in Armenian.
At a very young age, around 11 or 12, he began writing poetry and developed a deep love for learning. At 15, he entered the Gevorkian Theological Seminary in Etchmiadzin, where he received the news of his father’s sudden death. Following his father’s passing, the responsibility of caring for and managing the large family fell upon his mother’s shoulders.
His mother, Almast, affectionately called Apla, was a capable, wise, and deeply kind woman who had a special bond with her youngest child, Avetik, among her five sons and two daughters. Avetik, in turn, was devoted to his mother with an almost worshipful love. Yet, due to circumstances or perhaps fate, Avetik spent much of his life away from her, particularly because of his studies. The separation was equally painful for both. It is no coincidence that the theme of maternal love, filled with longing, holds a special place in his works, with many poems and writings dedicated to her. “It was worth coming into this world just to have a mother” he wrote, expressing his almost sacred affection for her.
And in his famous poem “Abu-Lala Mahari”, the poet who rejects all else, exalts only his mother:
“You, my immortal mother, motherly embrace,
You, the one pure, the one holy, holy.”
From an early age, the pain of their separation became a source of meaning and understanding in his poetry, a form of justification that carried forgiveness. In his verse, the image of the mother and that of the homeland merge into one:
“Dear mother, I left you,
Burdened with sorrow, I went away,
The voice of my holy homeland,
Of my people, called me, and I went.”
At the Gevorkian Seminary, Isahakyan and several other students were expelled for participating in a protest to improve student living conditions. He was only 15 at the time, and with a heavy heart he left the seminary and returned home.
At 16, he fell in love with a relative, Shushanik Matakyan, a young girl of extraordinary beauty, with dark, captivating eyes, only a year younger than him. She enchanted him, and their affection seemed mutual. He dedicated countless poems to her, and they exchanged letters of affection.
“Shushan girl, I am your captive,
Bound and chained without chains.
My heart burns with the flame of your love,
I have become parched with longing.”
Passionate about learning, he sought to continue his education and pursue a profession. He applied for readmission to the seminary and was accepted. Finding fifth grade insufficient for his intellectual abilities and aspirations, he decided to devote himself to literature and left for Tiflis (Tbilisi, Gorgia) soon after completing the school year.
During that time, his love ended abruptly. Shushik married someone else. Isahakyan carried the pain of deeply this unrequited love throughout his life. His “Memoirs” contain many entries written over the years that reveal the enduring pain of that lost affection. The emotions from this experience became the foundation of his love poetry, many of which later became folk songs still sung today.
“I loved, they took my beloved away,
They wounded me and took her away.
What a cruel world this is,
They tore my heart and took it away.”
Amid these heavy emotional struggles, Tiflis became a turning point in his life. For the first time, he found himself alone in a large city, a flourishing center of the Russian Empire, where Armenian publishing houses, leading cultural and educational institutions, the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF), and various public organizations were active. These became sources of awakening and self-discovery for him.
There, he became acquainted with many of the great Armenian intellectuals of the time, with whom he maintained lifelong friendships, most notably with Hovhannes Tumanyan. Tiflis gave him valuable life experience, gave him the opportunity to establish himself as a poet, publish his works, and gain recognition.
During his years in Tiflis, he wrote the poetic cycle “The Songs of Haiduks”, the first reflection of the Armenian fedayi (freedom fighter) movement in poetry. His literary success and involvement in political activity brought him considerable fame. Yet he was not content with what he had achieved. He understood the importance of higher education, especially in the context of the national liberation struggle, and decided to go abroad to pursue further studies.
In 1893, Isahakyan left for Vienna, where he stayed for about a month. The city with its museums, works of art, high level of civilization, and especially the activities of the Mekhitarist Congregation thriving in that foreign land had a profound influence on his intellectual and spiritual development.
Afterward, he went to Leipzig to pursue his studies. During his seminary years, he had taught himself German and long dreamed of studying in the land of Goethe and Beethoven. Naturally, he was able to follow his studies there without linguistic difficulty.
Due to limited financial resources, he was only able to attend Leipzig University as a non-degree student, enrolled in literature, philosophy and ethnography courses. His brothers, who opposed his higher education, failed to send him his rightful share of income from the family mill. As a result, the 19-year-old student endured severe material hardships abroad. We learn about this from an entry in his “Memoirs”:
“What an unbearable situation I am in. I have come to a foreign place, no one pays attention to me, my clothes are worn out, I am in debt, no letters from home…”
His years studying in Leipzig left a significant mark on both his personal and intellectual growth. Having grown up in a large family and accustomed from childhood to social engagement, he soon joined the university’s “Union of Armenian Students”. Its members, like him, were young Armenians from different parts of the homeland who would later become prominent figures in Armenian life, including Karapet Melik-Ohanjanyan, Gevorg Chorekchyan, Levon Shant, Manuk Abeghyan.
Although Isahakyan appreciated the university’s scholarly atmosphere, he was tormented by longing for his beloved mother. It was during this period that he wrote his well-known poem “A Gift to My Mother”.
“I have left my homeland,
Poor wanderer, I have no home.
Parted from my dear mother,
Sad and sorrowful, cannot sleep.”
As deeply as he was absorbed in his studies, he was continually drawn by an inner longing for his homeland. In the green meadows of Leipzig, he dreamed of and lived in memory of daily life in his native land. During this time, he wrote the poem “You are weary, the plowman” (Majkal es bezaraz es).
Inspired by the German masters – Goethe, Heine, Nietzsche, Wagner, and Beethoven, living in their land and reading their works in their own language, developed a bolder way of thinking and stronger confidence in his convictions and inspiration. A reflection of this inner strength is his famous poem “I Stand Firm as a Rock”, written during that period, which seemed to be a proclamation of self-affirmation and became the cornerstone of his biography. In the most difficult moments of his nation’s history, he himself became that steadfast, unshakable rock for his people.
“Hold on to me, you sinking souls,
I stand firm as a rock.
Cast your anchors beneath my feet,
I stand firm as a rock.”
At the end of 1894, though still in Germany, Isahakyan’s thoughts remained tied to his homeland, especially news from Western Armenia. German newspapers reported one after another about the massacres in Sassoun. Deeply disturbed and unable to find peace, he wrote:
“The German newspapers take the side of the Turk. The Germans are unbearable people, without feeling, greedy, money-loving… Beasts, savage humanity. And Europe rejoices, seeing only its own interests, applauding the tyrant. Tch, I spit on Europe and its so-called selfish culture”.
This was the outcry of a helpless, grief-stricken soul of a 19-year-old youth. Later, during the final massacres of his people, he would direct even more furious words towards Europe and the so-called civilized humanity.
“Tell us, Europe, where are you rushing
With your hands stained in Armenian blood?
You have torn apart Holy Armenia,
Now where do you flee with your bloody hands?”
The Leipzig period seems to have been a time of searching and self-discovery in both his thoughts and poetry. In his works, he expressed his aspiration: “I want to erase lies and ugliness, I want to create a whole world where boundless love blossom.” His longing for his homeland recurs in poems such as “Night has fallen, coolness descends”, “Amid the emotions of the sea of life”, alongside his never-fading love for Shushik.
Two years later, in 1895, Isahakyan returned to his homeland. In his “Memoirs” he wrote the following:
“Tomorrow I am going to my Homeland, beloved Caucasus, Aragats, mother, friends, and Shushik…For two years I lived through hunger and fullness, learned much and forgot much, yet suffered greatly in spirit. I have cast off Europe’s shell behind and embraced my homeland-free and unbound. My content is universal. In the past, I was another person; that was not Avetik Isahakyan. Now I am master of my own mind, now I am Avetik Isahakyan.”
With this steady and insatiable longing, he returned home and resumed his interrupted life amid the native landscape. He frequently visited Ani, which was near his birthplace, marveled at its handcrafted architecture, evaluating its beauty through the eyes of one who had seen many monuments and received an education, eagerly filling in what he had missed in his youth. However, times have changed politically. Western Armenia was in turmoil, shaken by ongoing massacres and liberation movements, leaving him no peace.
Back in Tiflis, he had joined the Hunchakian Party alongside Tumanyan and Aghayan, since it was an established and recognized revolutionary organization. As a result, he came under Tsarist persecution. The Tsarist anti-Armenian policy had openly begun targeting intellectuals through arrests and harassment. In 1896, before he could even overcome his longing for home, Isahakyan was arrested for his revolutionary views and imprisoned in the prison on the banks of the Zangu River (now Hrazdan River) in Yerevan.
Imprisonment did not crush the young man’s spirit or dedication to his homeland. Even while imprisoned, and alongside his thoughts about finding a path to his people’s liberation, he continued to create. After a year behind bars, he was released and wrote: “New life, after a year of death”.
Soon after, he published the small poetry collection titled “Songs and Wounds”, which during those turbulent days became a voice from the people’s heart and brought him immediate recognition and fame as a poet. Among the poems were “Cry for my inner pain” (Dards latsek), “Be afraid from Black Eyes”, and “Songs to Alagyaz” among others.
“Dark-black clouds crown your brow,
You are wrapped in mist, Alagyaz,
No sun blooms in my heart,
My heart itself is the mist, Alagyaz…”
After his release, he returned once more to Tiflis, continuing his literary and public activities. The Tsarist secret police, however, continued to pursue him, and he was again imprisoned, this time in the Metekhi Prison in Tiflis. Fortunately, by paying a large bail, he was granted the right to choose his place of exile. He was released from prison under the following verdict: “Convicted in the Armenian-Turkish affair, Isahakyan is exiled for one year to Odessa.”
In Odessa, he remained undeterred and continued to create. As always, he wrote about his beloved Mount Aragats, his eternal love Shushik, and the injustices of the world.
“Ah, our hearts are full of sorrow and pain,
We have seen neither day nor sun.
Alas, our lives have passed in darkness,
We have learned nothing from the world.”
By the end of the year, he was released from exile and returned to Tiflis. There, the most authoritative Armenian literary journal, “Murj” (The Hammer), where it had once been only a dream for him to see his work printed, now published his new works one after another.
During this period, the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun) intensified its activites within the country and gradually became the leading political party, whose primary mission was to awaken the Armenians from oppression, call for armed resistance, work for the final liberation of Western Armenia, and unite the two divided parts of Armenia.
This call spoke directly to Isahakyan’s heart. Along with many others, including Tumanyan, he joined the ranks. He established close friendships with party leaders Christapor Mikaelian and Simon Zavarian, sent poems and articles to their Geneva-based periodical “Droshak” (Flag), participated in their secret meetings in various locations such as Alexandropol, Constantinople, and other places, carried out assignments, and secretly transported weapons and funds to Western Armenia, ignoring the constant Tsarist police persecution against him.
To avoid persecution, for a time he published under the pen name “Hay Gusan” (The Armenian minstrel). Among the poems released under that name was one dedicated to Aghbiur Serob, from the series “Songs of the Hayduk”:
“Burn, wear crimson, You! Armenian people,
And raise your sword, clear your path.
In this world only the sword cuts deep,
Strike and conquer, be strong, invincible!
And firmly stamp your foot upon the earth,
Be master of your soil and your home.”
At the dawn of the 20th century, in 1900, Isahakyan felt the urge to resume his education in Europe and to dedicate himself fully to the Armenian Revolutionary Federation, which he believed was “The backbone of the Armenian people: the avenging and creative spirit, the Aryan will of the Armenian people”.
He was already 25 years old, when he left once again, this time for Switzerland, to complete his studies at the University of Zurich. Yet after a year and a half, homesickness called him back again. In a letter he wrote:
“I am tired of Europe, and I miss our people dearly, my mother, my sister, my sisters-in-law, the children, especially our musicians and villagers. Although I am studying well now, it does not inspire me. The purpose that brought me to Europe is not as strong as the longing to ride from one village to another, to hear dogs bark at me, to ask for cold water, and to have an Armenian girl bring it to me. I think I will return in May. I cannot stay in Europe. My soul is suffocating. I will not become a scholar (as no Armenian student will be), nor do I think about earning a living. Whatever happens, I cannot live far from my Armenian people, and that is final.”
He reflected these same feeling in his poetry:
“I would die for our soil, my priceless homeland,
Ah, one life is not enough to die for you.
If I only had a thousand and more,
I would offer them all, from the depths of my heart.”
No other creator has been so passionately bound to his homeland with such fervent love. His exceptional bond and unity with his country, its soil, and surroundings is a unique phenomenon. It was not mere words or an outburst of longing but a force that continued to guide him throughout his life. It is no wonder he wrote: “I emigrated from my homeland in body, but in soul I remained in my homeland.”
It is surprising that in Geneva, instead of enjoying Europe’s free life like his friends, he thought of Armenian fedayi, who sacrificed their lives for the freedom of Armenians in the Salno gorges, and wrote:
“In the Salno gorges, in the gorges of battle,
The hayduk falls with a deep wound in his heart.
The open wound like a rose,
And his hand rests upon broken rifle.”
The young man who wrote these lines left his studies unfinished, and two years later, in 1902, returned to his homeland, Alexandropol. He created in solitude, frequently traveling to Tiflis to recharge his energy through contact with prominent Armenian literary and political figures.
During this period, together with Hovhannes Tumanyan, Ghazaros Aghayan, Derenik Demirchian, and Nikol Aghbalian, they established the famous literary organization Vernatun, the first Armenian writers’ association in the modern sense.
By the beginning of the century, Isahakyan was already a renowned poet. Many of his poems were immediately embraced by the people, becoming songs and work chants, often without anyone even knowing the author’s name. Isahakyan himself recalled one such moment:
“One day, while passing through a field, I heard a villager singing my poem ‘You are cripple, you are worn out’ (Majkal es, bezaraz es), with mistakes. I approached and tried to correct him, but the villager rudely shouted at me, saying: ‘What do you know? You’ve come from the city to teach us folk songs?’”
There is no higher compliment for a poet than when their work becomes part of the people. It is beyond success that someone could ask for.
His uniquely rich biography, from studying at the seminary in Etchmiadzin to attending the universities of Leipzig and Zurich, from publications in the Armenian press at home and abroad, in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Geneva, Paris, and Venice, to writing patriotic articles and essays, gave new inspiration to those fighting for the liberation of their homeland. Invitations and hospitality came to him from all sides, and he was constantly welcomed and hosted.
During one of those days in Tiflis, he was invited to the Kocharyants family, who had recently relocated from Shushi, Karabagh.
The unexpected death of the family’s father, Manas, had compelled his widow, Zhenya, to move to Tiflis with her large family of eight children, five boys and three girls, for the sake of a better future for them.
That day, from the very first acquaintance, an inner bond formed between the eldest daughter, Sofia, and the 33-year-old Avetik, a connection that would completely change their destiny.
During those turbulent political times, when the already well-known poet was also engaged in political activities, it was impossible to escape the pursuit of the Tsarist police. Upon his return from abroad, he had been interrogated several times by the authorities about his stay overseas, and Isahakyan, who had stammered since childhood, claimed that “he had gone abroad for medical treatment of his speech impediment”.
Despite this, Isahakyan was imprisoned in Metekhi Prison for the second time, along with over 100 progressive Armenian intellectuals, including Tumanyan. Once again, through a large bail of 5,000 Imperial rubles, he was released pending trial.
During this temporary “freedom,” he continued to write without pause, composing his masterpiece novel “Master Karo”, the poem “Masma Manouk” about the massacre of Western Armenians, and his masterpiece “Abu-Lala Mahari”. At the same time, he contemplated his personal life. His choice of Sofia was final.
On June 27, 1910, having received his beloved mother’s blessing in the Church of “Seven Wounds” in Gyumri, where he had been baptized, the wedding procession set out in carriages toward the Cathedral of Ani, the dream of his childhood, to be married there. Guests included Hovhannes Tumanyan, Nikol Aghbalian, and many others.
Blessed under the magnificent arches of the Cathedral, the vow they made to each other would be kept with the same sacred devotion for 47 years, as they endured unspeakable hardships and weathered many geopolitical storms across different lands, until their journey came to an end on the cherished soil of their beloved homeland.
By the end of that same year, the trial of Armenian intellectuals, known as the “Dashnak Case” was approaching.
According to Isahakyan’s grandson and scholar, Professor Avik Isahakyan, before the trial, Mrs. Sofia met with her husband’s lawyer, Alexander Kerensky, who would later become the head of the Russian Provisional Government. She told him that the charges against her husband were fabricated and pleaded with him to do everything possible to secure his release, having just started a new family and had a newborn child.
Kerensky told her that the accusations against Isahakyan were extremely serious. He was charged with supplying arms and funds to liberation groups operating in Turkey and engaging in subversive activities within the empire’s territory. It was impossible to save him from a death sentence or exile to Siberia. Kerensky could only advise that Isahakyan find a way to leave the country.
With no other choice, Isahakyan left his beloved homeland, parting from his newly formed family and his infant son Vigen, for an unknown period and an uncertain destiny.
In 1911, through secret routes, he crossed the Russian-Turkish border, entering Karin, then Erzurum and Constantinople. In these places also he engaged actively in political work, writing, “The muse does not let me become a brave man, the sword does not let me become a minstrel.” Torn between these two paths, and avoiding Turkish intelligence, he made his way to Vienna, and then to Zurich, Switzerland.
A year later, his wife Sofia and their two-year-old son Vigen finally managed to join him in Zurich.
In his remarkable memoir “Sofia: Avetik’s Good Angel”, their grandson Avik Isahakyan describes his grandmother’s courage and devotion to her husband. When Isahakyan welcomed his family at the Zurich train station, he noticed that his wife had brought along many hat boxes. Surprised, he asked her where she planned to wear all those hats. When they reached home, Sofia opened the boxes, revealing not hats but the manuscripts of Isahakyan’s novel “Master Karo”, the epic “Abu-Lala Mahari”, and his poems and writings left behind in Tiflis. Sofia had cleverly hidden and smuggled her husband’s works out of the country, saving what Isahakyan himself had been unable to take when fleeing illegally. Truly, Sofia was a woman worthy of the great Isahakyan.
Avetik Isahakyan with his grandson Avik Isahakyan (1957)
Thus began 25 long years of exile for Isahakyan and his family, spent in Germany, Switzerland, Italy, France, Vienna, Geneva, and Collonges.
“On foreign, desolate roads
My caravan softly rings.
Halt, caravan, it seems to me
That someone from my homeland calls”
“On a Foreign Winter Road” (“Odar amayi jampeqi vra”)
Isahakyan’s profound attachment to the Armenian language, was equally remarkable. Though fluent in five languages, he wrote exclusively in Armenian, which caused him severe financial hardship in Europe.
His son, Vigen Isahakyan, vividly describes these years of exile in his memoir “My Father”. He recalls his father’s deep anguish upon receiving the news of the Armenian massacres of 1915. That same year, Isahakyan also learned of the death of his beloved mother, Apla, a blow that threw him into profound despair.
As mentioned earlier, his mother had been the lifeblood of his existence, while his homeland was the vital force that nourished that lifeblood. Losing both at once broke him deeply. He wrote, “Unfortunate those who dies on foreign soil”, and in his will he left this wish:
“When I die, bury me on the slopes of Alagyaz,
That the winds from Mantash may come,
Breathe upon me and pass.”
In 1926, the Isahakyan family was living in Venice, where they hosted Yegishe Charents and Martiros Saryan from Soviet Armenia. Interacting with them once again plunged the writer into intense emotional turmoil, and his unquenchable longing for his homeland resurfaced. No matter how much he despised the Soviet regime, no matter how bitterly he wrote, “It is hard, even impossible, to deal with those dogs. There is no law, no justice, only terror. They have turned a rag, dyed red with the blood of millions, into a fetish, and beneath it lies a foolish, absurd Mongolian ideology, ignorant, primitive, bestial communism, to which entire generations and cultures are being sacrificed.” Nevertheless, he decided to travel alone to Soviet Armenia.
15 years had passed since his last departure. Much had changed in Armenia. The country was in severe poverty, and upon his long-awaited arrival in his native land, a massive earthquake had reduced his birthplace to ruins. The Ghazarapat mill, their family home, and the traces of his childhood were all destroyed.
Yet his love and bond with that soil were so deep that he paid no attention either to the prevailing poverty or to the tyranny that ruled the country. “It is a happiness to live in the homeland”, he wrote to his son.
Although Isahakyan was officially permitted to stay in Soviet Armenia for only six months, it took four years before he was allowed to leave. It was clear that the author of “Songs of the Haiduks”, a political exile and Dashnak activist, could not enjoy real freedom of movement. In fact, it was fortunate that he had not been arrested.
Remarkably, these hardships did not discourage him. He returned from his visit to the homeland with a final decision: his and his family’s future would be in Armenia. “I am tired of the life of a European exile” he wrote. He went Paris with the intention of gathering his belongings and move his family permanently to Armenia.
That same year, 1930, in a letter to his close friend and leading ARF member, Vahan Navasardian, he wrote sincerely:
“I don’t know what to do. Before leaving Armenia, Soviet authorities, made me promise to return (which explains the delay in his return). I gave my word. I want to go back, and I don’t want to go back. I don’t want to break my word as well. This will weigh heavily on the local intelligentsia. But to go and fall again under oppression, to grow furious, to devour each other and remain silent, that I also do not want. Yet to stay in this loathsome Paris is just as unbearable.”
Certainly, Isahakyan was no naïve man, and his decision to live in his homeland was far from a superficial, sentimental choice. He had endured a life of immense struggle and hardship: imprisoned several times, pursued by the police, and he knew well that life there would not be easy. He was not certain how the authorities would treat him this time, especially since rumors of arrests had already begun to spread.
Yet simply being on his native soil brought him a profound mental and emotional peace. In 1936, during the hardest years of Stalin’s rule, he returned to Soviet Armenia with Sofia, while their son Vigen had arrived a year earlier.
Avetik and Sophie Isahakyan (1957)
Surprisingly, the Soviet authorities did not disturb Isahakyan during those bloody years. It was clear that his immense popularity, both within Armenia and abroad, was so great that any act of persecution against him would have immediately exposed to the world the crimes being committed inside the country, which the regime was desperately to conceal behind the so-called “Iron Curtain”.
His presence, his very breath, during the harshest Stalinist years, was itself a source of strength and comfort for the Armenian people. He was not only revered by the population, but in those dire times, became a moral anchor, a preserver of the Armenian language, and a living embodiment of cultural endurance.
Having left behind the world’s most beautiful cities, he chose his small, humble, oppressed homeland. A country scarred by genocide, the victory at Sardarapat, the creation and loss of the First Republic, and now subjected to a new tyranny, he placed the suffering, exhausted people above the refined comforts of Europe. Through his poetry, his presence, and his personal sacrifices, he became the living memory of the nation. With profound respect, people came to call him the Master (Varbed).
The people’s admiration to the Master grew daily, not only through his publications, which were immediately consumed, but also because of his actions.
In 1949, at the First All-Union Peace Conference held in Moscow, where he was the sole representative from Armenia, Isahakyan showed remarkable courage. He delivered his speech in Armenian and openly addressing the Armenian people’s greatest tragedy, saying:
“During the First Imperialist War, with Germany’s encouragement and the consent of the Triple Entente, Sultanate Turkey massacred one quarter of the Armenian people, one million Armenians”.
For the first time, such a bold declaration was made in a country that had political ties with Turkey. His words were translated and circulated across the world, further strengthening his name and authority, both among his own people and throughout the other Soviet republics.
Until the very end of his life, he lived in the presence of his people, concerned with the fate of Karabakh, Sevan, and the preservation of Armenian identity, constantly appealing to both local and higher authorities. He devoted all his efforts to instilling in younger generations a sense of patriotism, love, and reverence for the Armenian language, as well as a commitment to preserving Armenian traditions and the homeland.
“If there is one sacred thing for which I live, it is the Armenian orphan, the suffering Armenian people, the self-sacrificing Armenian soldier. I spit on all the rest, whether they are comrades, politicians, or diplomats.”
With this conviction, he lived through his country’s most difficult years, enduring every trial alongside his people. Through his poetry, he became their song, their solace, and the balm for their wounds.
On October 17, 1957, the great Isahakyan was forever united with the soil he so loved. His restless spirit finally found the peace he had long dreamed of, in the homeland he had worshiped. To his people, he left this immortal testament:
“Kissing these three words; Nation, Language, Homeland, I entrust them to the Armenian people, to preserve, fulfill, strengthen, develop, and eternalize.”
Who could have imagined that on the 150th anniversary of his birth, his wise testament would resound once again as an urgent call, awakening and uniting the Armenian nation to stand firm in defense of its identity?
Indeed, the march of the wise giants is eternal.
Isahakyan appeared in the life of the Armenian people like a comet, he sang, preached, struggle, wept, burned, and became eternal.
