Hovhannes Tumanyan

Who is Hovhannes Tumanyan?

Hovhannes Tumanyan was an Armenian poet, writer, translator, and public figure, born in the village of Dsegh in the Lori region to a family descended from the historic Mamikonian princely line. He moved as a young man to Tiflis, then the center of Armenian cultural life, where he studied at the Nersisyan School and wrote his first poems as a boy. Over his career he produced lyric poetry, ballads, ethical ballads, ballads drawn from folk material, fables, and prose fiction, largely in a realist style rooted in the everyday life of Armenian villagers, and he also translated the work of Byron, Goethe, and Pushkin into Armenian. In 1921 he founded the House of Armenian Art in Tiflis to support Armenian writers and artists during a turbulent postwar period. He earned the enduring popular title "Poet of All Armenians" after publicly defending the rights of Armenian refugees, and many phrases from his poems and fables have passed into everyday Armenian speech. He remains Armenia's most widely read national poet, honored today with museums in both Dsegh and Yerevan.

Sources: Armenianhouse.org, "Hovhannes Tumanyan — Biography" · Armenia Genocide Museum-Institute, "150th Anniversary of Hovhannes Tumanyan" · Armeniapedia, "Hovhannes Tumanyan"