Есаян Забел
YESAYAN ZABEL
Есаян Забел Никитична
Ованесян Забел Никитична
ESSAYAN Zabel
http://www.armenianhouse.org/yesayan/yesayan-en.html
ZABEL YESAYAN
1878 - 1943
Zabel Yessayan (alternate spellings: Yessaian, Esayan, Essayan, etc.), a gifted novelist who was considered the female counterpart to Krikor Zohrab, was born in Scutari, a district of Constantinople. From an early age, she wanted to be a writer and as early as age 17 she published a short piece in a literary magazine. She obtained higher education in Paris where she worked her way through the Sorbonne by revising a French-Armenian dictionary and by writing articles and short stories for French and Armenian magazines. She returned to Constantinople at the age of 30 to enjoy an active literary life, well recognized for her talent. The Young Turks ranked her with Zohrab, Zartarian, Siamanto and Varoujan and placed her name - the only female writer - on their list for liquidation. She escaped to Bulgaria and from there managed to reach the Caucasus where she documented much of the atrocities taking place...
Biography See also:
Other essays and biographies by Ruth Bedevian: Khachatur Abovian Khrimian Hayrig Hovhannes Hovhannesyan Mikael Nalbandyan Arshak Chobanyan Petros Duryan
http://www.armenianhouse.org/yesayan/bio-en.html
Biography WRITING - HER LIFE'S MISSION
Writers in the 20th century were destroyed by either The Genocide of 1915 or the Stalin Purge that began in 1937. Zabel Yessayan was silenced in the latter.
Zabel Yessayan (alternate spellings: Yessaian, Esayan, Essayan), a gifted novelist who was considered the female counterpart to Krikor Zohrab, was born in Scutari, a district of Constantinople. From an early age, she wanted to be a writer and as early as age 17 she published a short piece in a literary magazine. She obtained higher education in Paris where she worked her way through the Sorbonne by revising a French-Armenian dictionary and by writing articles and short stories for French and Armenian magazines. She returned to Constantinople at the age of 30 to enjoy an active literary life, well recognized for her talent. The Young Turks ranked her with Zohrab, Zartarian, Siamanto and Varoujan and placed her name - the only female writer - on their list for liquidation. She escaped to Bulgaria and from there managed to reach the Caucasus where she documented much of the atrocities taking place. In 1918 she went to Egypt, then to Cilicia and then to Paris, serving in the Armenian Delegation for Peace. Disillusioned, she became a Communist and urged all Diaspora Armenians to recognize Soviet Armenia as the only motherland.
In 1927 she visited Soviet Armenia for the first time. Shortly afterwards she was invited to establish permanent residence. In 1933 at the age of 55, she left a comfortable Parisian life and settled in Soviet Armenia with her daughter, Sophie and son, Hrant. When she was asked how she could tolerate the discomforts of living in Yerevan after the opulence of Paris, she replied with a scowl, "These inconveniences are meaningless in my eyes because I take an active part in building the future of our country. Does that answer your question?" (Ararat/Winter 1979 page 12) In Yerevan, she taught Comparative Literature and French Literature at the University, wrote numerous articles and published prolifically. A writer can express only what he/she experiences, feels deeply and knows well. A successful writer is the one who writes about what he knows best and that takes time for the art to develop and mature. This was her philosophy, her mantra. One of her outstanding pieces was The Gardens of Silihdar, which describes her upbringing in the district of Scutari. This has been translated into English by Ara Balizoian. Recalling its beauty, she writes, "….I take refuge in them (gardens) every time ominous dark clouds pile up on the horizon of my life." Yessayan was accused of "nationalism" and fostering nostalgia for times past -- an excuse to silence her powerful voice.
The same accusations were made against Bakounts, Totovents, Armen, and Mahari. Yessayan came to the defense of her colleagues and she, too, was exiled. The year was 1937 and Yessayan was 59 years old. Bakounts and Totovents were shot. Mahari and Armen returned from exile years later to write of their experiences. Yessayan did not. It is believed, but not confirmed that she was drowned and most likely died in exile sometime in 1943. She was allowed neither pen nor paper in the camp. The years between 1937 and 1943 must have been torture for a woman with her zest for life, who thrived on producing and writing from the depths of her being.
Through her writing she championed the cause of women's liberation; her writing demands a re-evaluation of women's rights. She cared deeply for her people, particularly those living in the interior of Turkey, having toured the aftermath of the massacres in Adana in 1909. She reported her experiences in a narrative entitled, "Amid The Ruins," a sensitive account of the carnage and devastation; it is a clear and first-class piece of journalism. Her writing radiates genuine compassion and artistry.
Some of her other works: The Waiting Room, Hours of Agony, The Last Cup (Chalice), My Soul in Exile, Uncle Khatchik, Phony Geniuses, The Veil, When They Don't Love Anymore, Meliha Nouri Hanem, Shirt of Fire, Retreating Forces.
Source: ARARAT Winter Issue 1979; Writers of Disaster by Marc Nichanian; A Reference Guide to Modern Armenian Literature, 1500-1920 by Kevork B. Bardakjian.
by Ruth Bedevian
Acknowledgements:
Provided by: Ruth Bedevian
© Ruth Bedevian. Published with the permission of the author. No copying or any sort of redistribution allowed without the prior written permission of the author. See also:
Other essays and biographies by Ruth Bedevian: Khachatur Abovian Khrimian Hayrig Hovhannes Hovhannesyan Mikael Nalbandyan Arshak Chobanyan Petros Duryan
Zabel Yesayian
Novelist, short story writer, and essayist, she is one of Armenia's most talented prose writers of the twentieth century.
Zabel Yesayian, Constantinople born, and Sorbonne educated, published essays on French literature, and women's and social issues. She survived the 1915 genocide only to fall victim to Stalin's purges.
She leaves a legacy of social concerns, a strong sense of patriotism, and her literature.
Armenia's foremost novelist, short story writer and essayist, Zabel Hovanesian, was born in 1878 in the district of Silihtar, in Constantinople. After her graduation from the Holy Cross Armenian school in Scutari she went to Paris to study literature and philosophy at the Sorbonne in 1895. Here she met and married Armenian painter Dikran Yesayian (1874-1921). Already a professional writer, Yesayian returned to Constantinople in 1902. Refusing the only career path for literary women as public educators, she began publishing essays on French literature, women's, and social issues. In 1909 Yesayian was sent to investigate the aftermath of the Armenian massacres in Cilicia, which became material for her book Among the Ruins (1911), a chilling witness account and interviews with survivors.
During World War I Yesayian was listed as one of the Armenian intellectuals to be arrested in April of 1915; she escaped the arrest by chance and hid several months in Constantinople before eventually fleeing to Bulgaria. In exile Yesayian served as a spokesperson and missionary for the Armenian refugees and orphans, traveling through the Caucasus, Iran, Iraq and Egypt, and helping set up orphanages. She wrote and published numerous articles on the plight of the Armenian people and the survivors of the Genocide, among which "The Agony of a People" (1917) and "Le role de la femme armenienne pendant la guerre" (1922).
After her husband's death, in 1922 Yesayian settled in Paris with her mother and two children, where she lectured and continued writing. In 1933, at the invitation of the Soviet Armenian government and the campaigns to "return to the land," Yesayian moved to Yerevan. She read lectures on French literature at the Yerevan State University and wrote important new works including Shirt of Flame (1934), the autobiography Gardens of Silihtar (1935) and her last book Uncle Khachik (1966), which appeared only posthumously. Marked as an antirevolutionary and a nationalist, Yesayian was heavily criticized and hounded by Stalin's people. During the height of the Great Terror involving the 1936-37 "show trials" and the mass arrests of "people's enemies," Yesayian was arrested along with Yeghishe Charents, Aksel Bakounts and Vahan Totovents, and deported to Siberia. According to the official death certificate, Zabel Yesayian died in 1937, the year of her arrest, but her daughter, Sophie, recorded that her mother's death occurred sometime in 1942-3, place unknown. In her appeal to the Soviet government, Sophie wrote: "I would have liked to bury her in the Pantheon, in her dear homeland, among her people. That would have been her most desired final home, "at the foot of Mount Ararat" as she liked to say."
Bibliography Autobiography [Inknakensagrutiun]. Yerevan: Sovetakan grakanutiun, 1979. Out of Print. Among the Ruins [Averaknerun mej, 1911]. Out of Print. Civilized People. [Shnorkov mardik]. Constantinople: Sagsian, 1907. Out of Print. Hours of Solitude [Andzkutian zhamer, 1924]. Out of Print. Fake Geniuses [Keghts hancharner]. Constantinople: Biuzandian Gratun, 1909. Out of Print. Gardens of Silihtar [Silihtari parteznere]. Yerevan: PetHrat, 1935. Out of Print. In the Waiting Room [Spasman srahin mej]. Tsaghik, 1903. Out of Print. The Last Chalice [Verjin bazhake]. Constantinople: Cilicia, 1924. Out of Print. The Man [Marde]. Masis, (March 26, 1905): 68. Out of Print. Meliha Nuri Hanem. Paris: Taron, 1928. Out of Print. Murat's Journey [Murati chambordutiune, 1920]. Out of Print. My Exiled Soul [Hogis akslorial]. Out of Print. Retreating Forces [Nahanjogh uzhere, 1923]. Out of Print. Shirt of Flame [Airvogh shapik, 1934]. Out of Print. Uncle Khachik [Barpa Khachik, 1966]. Out of Print. When They Don't Love Anymore [Yerb ailevs chen sirer, 1914]. Out of Print.
early editorial by Zabel Yesayian from Victoria Rowe's A History of Armenian Women's Writing:1880--1922
The "women's section" of Tsaghik must endeavor to publish useful and masterful articles in a popular and clear way. It should keep our women informed of the work in the areas of education and charity that women in other countries are doing. For this series of publications, which has all the difficulties of being the first of its kind, we have great hopes of our women's contributions. These pages are open to all who have something to express or a cause to defend and we are sure that from our women writers' efforts, all classes of women will be able to contribute to this "Women's Section," which has definite educational and charitable goals."
Sources: The above information is compiled by Shushan Avagyan. Born in Yerevan, Armenia, she is currently pursuing her doctorate in English and Women's Studies, and is the recipient of Dalkey Archive Press fellowship at the Illinois State University. She can be reached at savagya@ilstu.edu.
For further information on Yesayian read Victoria Rowe's A History of Armenian Women's Writing: 1880--1922, Cambridge Scholars Press Ltd. London, 2003.
Also search out Ara Baliozian's translations of Zabel Yessayan's memoirs: "Zabel Yessayan by Zabel Yessayan," and selections from The Gardens Of Silihdar.
Note that alternate spellings of her name include Yessayan, Yessaian, Esayan, Essayan.
http://www.aiwa-net.org/AIWAwriters/
http://www.armeniapedia.org/index.php?title=Zabel_Esayan
Zabel Esayan
WHAT I AM READING Compiled by John Freeman
The Australian December 10, 2005 Saturday All-round Review Edition
SOURCE: MATP
"I'm reading a most extraordinary book by a most extraordinary writer: Zabel Esayan's Among the Ruins. She lived in the late Ottoman Empire, the only woman writer on a list of 234 Armenian intellectuals that the Young Turks found dangerous and decided to eliminate. She miraculously escaped the 1915 killings and deportation of Armenians, only to die in Stalin's Siberia. She was a true intellectual, in constant exile."
ElifShafak, author of The Flea Palace.
This article contains text from a source with a copyright. Please help us by extracting the factual information and eliminating the rest in order to keep the site in accordance to fair use standards. You can help Armeniapedia by editing it.
http://www.aiwa-net.org/AIWAwriters/
Zabel Yesayian
Zabel Yesayian (1878 - 1943) Novelist, short story writer, and essayist, she is one of Armenia's most talented prose writers of the twentieth century.
Zabel Yesayian, Constantinople born, and Sorbonne educated, published essays on French literature, and women's and social issues. She survived the 1915 genocide only to fall victim to Stalin's purges.
She leaves a legacy of social concerns, a strong sense of patriotism, and her literature.
Armenia's foremost novelist, short story writer and essayist, Zabel Hovanesian, was born in 1878 in the district of Silihtar, in Constantinople. After her graduation from the Holy Cross Armenian school in Scutari she went to Paris to study literature and philosophy at the Sorbonne in 1895. Here she met and married Armenian painter Dikran Yesayian (1874-1921). Already a professional writer, Yesayian returned to Constantinople in 1902. Refusing the only career path for literary women as public educators, she began publishing essays on French literature, women’s, and social issues. In 1909 Yesayian was sent to investigate the aftermath of the Armenian massacres in Cilicia, which became material for her book Among the Ruins (1911), a chilling witness account and interviews with survivors.
During World War I Yesayian was listed as one of the Armenian intellectuals to be arrested in April of 1915; she escaped the arrest by chance and hid several months in Constantinople before eventually fleeing to Bulgaria. In exile Yesayian served as a spokesperson and missionary for the Armenian refugees and orphans, traveling through the Caucasus, Iran, Iraq and Egypt, and helping set up orphanages. She wrote and published numerous articles on the plight of the Armenian people and the survivors of the Genocide, among which “The Agony of a People” (1917) and “Le role de la femme armenienne pendant la guerre” (1922).
After her husband’s death, in 1922 Yesayian settled in Paris with her mother and two children, where she lectured and continued writing. In 1933, at the invitation of the Soviet Armenian government and the campaigns to “return to the land,” Yesayian moved to Yerevan. She read lectures on French literature at the Yerevan State University and wrote important new works including Shirt of Flame (1934), the autobiography Gardens of Silihtar (1935) and her last book Uncle Khachik (1966), which appeared only posthumously. Marked as an antirevolutionary and a nationalist, Yesayian was heavily criticized and hounded by Stalin’s people. During the height of the Great Terror involving the 1936-37 “show trials” and the mass arrests of “people’s enemies,” Yesayian was arrested along with Yeghishe Charents, Aksel Bakounts and Vahan Totovents, and deported to Siberia. According to the official death certificate, Zabel Yesayian died in 1937, the year of her arrest, but her daughter, Sophie, recorded that her mother’s death occurred sometime in 1942-3, place unknown. In her appeal to the Soviet government, Sophie wrote: “I would have liked to bury her in the Pantheon, in her dear homeland, among her people. That would have been her most desired final home, “at the foot of Mount Ararat” as she liked to say.”
Bibliography Autobiography [Inknakensagrutiun]. Yerevan: Sovetakan grakanutiun, 1979. Out of Print. Among the Ruins [Averaknerun mej, 1911]. Out of Print. Civilized People. [Shnorkov mardik]. Constantinople: Sagsian, 1907. Out of Print. Hours of Solitude [Andzkutian zhamer, 1924]. Out of Print. Fake Geniuses [Keghts hancharner]. Constantinople: Biuzandian Gratun, 1909. Out of Print. Gardens of Silihtar [Silihtari parteznere]. Yerevan: PetHrat, 1935. Out of Print. In the Waiting Room [Spasman srahin mej]. Tsaghik, 1903. Out of Print. The Last Chalice [Verjin bazhake]. Constantinople: Cilicia, 1924. Out of Print. The Man [Marde]. Masis, (March 26, 1905): 68. Out of Print. Meliha Nuri Hanem. Paris: Taron, 1928. Out of Print. Murat’s Journey [Murati chambordutiune, 1920]. Out of Print. My Exiled Soul [Hogis akslorial]. Out of Print. Retreating Forces [Nahanjogh uzhere, 1923]. Out of Print. Shirt of Flame [Airvogh shapik, 1934]. Out of Print. Uncle Khachik [Barpa Khachik, 1966]. Out of Print. When They Don’t Love Anymore [Yerb ailevs chen sirer, 1914]. Out of Print.
Zabel ESSAYAN ( 1878 - 1943 )
Comme elle l'indique elle-m?me au d?but des "Jardins de Silihdar", Zabel Essayan, Hovhanessian de son nom de jeune fille, ?tait n?e en 1878 ? Scutari (quartier de Constantinople), sur la rive asiatique du Bosphore. Apr?s ses ?tudes primaires et secondaires, elle alla d?s l'?ge de dix-sept ans, suivre les cours de litt?rature et de philosophie ? la Sorbonne et au Coll?ge de France, et c'est ? Paris qu'elle ?pousa le peintre Tigran Essayan; En 1895, elle publie son premier po?me en prose dans la revue "Tsaghik", puis ce seront des nouvelles, des essais, des articles, des traductions publi?es dans le Mercure de France et des p?riodiques arm?niens comme Massis, Anahit, Aravelian Mamoul. En 1908, elle rentre ? Constantinople et publie par la suite "Parmi les ruines", qui a trait aux massacres de Cilicie. En 1915, pour ?chapper ? la d?portation et ? la mort, elle fuit en Bulgarie et de l? au Caucase. Apr?s la guerre, elle collaborera aux travaux de la D?l?gation de la R?publique arm?nienne ? Paris, puis s'occupera des secours aux r?fugi?s et aux orphelins dans divers centres du Proche-Orient. A noter un tr?s beau texte, qu'il est possible de trouver en biblioth?que universitaire, "Le r?le de la femme pendant la guerre", Revue des Etudes Arm?niennes, Tome II, ann?e 1922, pages 121 ? 138.
En 1926,elle se rend en Arm?nie sovi?tique, puis revient en France et livre ses impression dans "Prom?th?e d?cha?n?" qui para?t ? Marseille en 1928. C'est en 1933 qu'elle s'installa d?finitivement en Arm?nie dont elle acceptait sinc?rement le r?gime politique et l'ann?e suivante elle assista ? Moscou au premier congr?s des ?crivains sovi?tiques.
"Les Jardins de Silihdar" parut en 1935. Deux autres volumes devaient suivre, mais en 1937 elle fut victime de la terreur stalinienne et disparut en Sib?rie o? elle mourut, probablement en 1943.
Revue ANI, les Cahiers arm?niens, num?ro 5
L'Univers lumineux de la litt?rature
Ed. Catholicossat arm?nien de Cilicie, 1988 Les jardins de Silidhar : roman Ed. Albin Michel, 1994, ISBN 2226064168
ЕСАЯН (псевд., наст. фамилия Ованесян), Забел Никитична (1879-1941), писательница. МЛИ АН Арм. ССР, ф. 42, 2200 ед. хр., 1890-1930.
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В 1920–1930-е интенсивное развитие получила социально-детермированная литература. Темы труда, социальной справедливости звучали в творчестве А.Акопяна, поэтессы Ш.Кургинян, Г.Сарьяна, М.Арази. В этот период важнейшими факторами развития армянской литературы стала борьба идей, сочетание традиций классического искусства и новых веяний. Произведения поэтов – О.Туманяна, А.Исаакяна, В.Теряна, И.Иоаннисяна, и прозаиков – А.Ширванзаде, Нар-Доса, Д.Демирчяна – стали вехами в истории литературы. Заметные явления в поэзии 1920–1930-х – стихи и басни детского писателя А.Хнкояна, лирические стихи Г.Сарьяна, Г.Маари, С.Таронци, Н.Зарьяна. Армянская проза 1920–1930-х характеризуется тематическим и жанрово-стилистическим многообразием. Стефан Зорьян – представитель психологической прозы, исторической эпопеи; принципы реалистического искусства получили своеобразное преломление в лирической прозе Акселя Бакунца. Другим армянским прозаиком был Дереник Демирчян – мастер рассказа и эпического повествования (роман Вардананк). Интересными страницами армянской прозы стали повести и романы В.О.Тотовенца, Г.Г.Маари, З.Есаян, М.Армена, М.Дарбиняна. Зулумян Бурастан Армянская литература // Энциклопедия Кругосвет // http://www.krugosvet.ru/articles/118/1011802/1011802a4.htm
