But it is anticipated that it will happen in the school textbooks. The school curriculum of literature is made in such a way that the knowledge of the students starts from Mashtos and ends with Hrant Matevosyan. So it is impossible to receive any information about the modern literature. Perhaps the reason is that, according to the developers of literature curriculums, the modern writers don’t have any valuable pieces. So it would be a total waste of time for the students to become acquainted with those writers and their pieces. But the doctor of literature, expert of literature Ani Pashayan and the candidate for literature Arkmenik Nikoghosyan have a different opinion.
A.P. –Armenian language and literature subjects should be most expected ones. Literature is among the first with its context and existence. Here the teacher has to play a priority role. We should understand who the teacher is and how he/she teaches. It is impossible to connect teaching of literature with only the textbooks. First of all the student should have interest to the subject and this interest is formed during the class. As of the contents of the book the authors of literature textbooks are real experts; they are famous with their experience. And it would be wrong to say that the books lack quality.
– The literature textbooks cannot lack quality with only one justification that the material is good as a rule. It is another matter that by maintaining chronology they first study Narekatsi, Shnorhali and then in two grades they come to study Shiraz.
A.N.-In the soviet education system the textbooks had a slightly different structure till the 8th grade. Those are general lessons, where various type of literature is included. In those chronology is not that important. They choose material, which matches the age and is more understandable to school students. Starting from the 8th grade the child used to get introduced to the subject of history of Armenian literature. Currently I also think that the key principle of the history of literature is maintained in the textbooks and it is possible to go through the process based on chronology. The bad thing is that we have certain stereotyped principles, which we cannot get rid of. And I don’t mean just crossing out the names of these people from the textbooks but speaking of them in general. I think that the teaching of the mother language is not done very well in the 8-9-10 grades. The current literate Armenian can be learned by the school students with major difficulties. I have noticed that they don’t manage to digest and fully comprehend Narekatsi.
– The students?
A.N. -The same can be said about some of the teachers as well. If I ascribed myself the right to write textbooks I wouldn’t go very deep in the medieval literature and I would open more space for the modern authors. During the past 20-30 years in Armenia there are certain values, which are worth being included in the textbooks. On the other hand, if we wish the teaching of literature to match the modern standards, to ensure that the student likes literature it is necessary to reflect in the textbooks the modern times.
– Nonetheless, modern literature is not presented in schools. The last author, who the student gets to meet in school, is Hrant Matevosyan. Perhaps it wouldn’t be a big waste pf time to know the modern authors.
A.P.-Yes the word “waste of time” is very appropriate. The student doesn’t imagine that he can go out to the street and meet a writer. In his opinion the last writer was Hovhannes Tumanyan. Let’s test the knowledge of teachers and ask them to name modern writers. How many doctors do they know, who live and create next pieces next to us and suffer? They suffer because they like to be recognized and that their pieces are read. I am sure each student will enjoy if the teacher starts to allot a little time to modern writers. It would also be great to invite writers as guest speakers to these classes. Of course, I don’t think that the 7th grade student is ready to read the pieces of Levon Khechoyan but he/she would know his name.
A.N. -I have come to a very sorrowful conclusion during my studies. The majority of the literature teachers even don’t have minimum criteria. The most stunning thing is that the teachers do not train themselves. The trainings of the ministry have a symbolic character. They have spoken about the same things for years. For example, they say that Mesrop Mashtots was born in Hatsekats village of Taron, to carpenter Vardan’s family. But the modern literature has long ago come to the conclusion that Mashtost’s family was not a carpenter. And that it came from the soviet ideology. And if the teacher is not able to learn this primitive thing it would be ridiculous to assume that she’d be able to speak about the modern literature and efficiently train the students. But we don’t sit with our arms crossed. We have been visiting schools for the past 4-5 years. We have even provided free of charge consultations. Today we still invite teachers once or twice a month. During these meetings the current experts of literature update them on the news existing in the literate.
– The list of modern writers is long but the attitude of the writers to each other as a rule is not very amiable. As long as the writer is alive and plus he is talented it is not very welcome to say good words about him.
A.N. -The theme of the envy and jealousy of the writers is eternal. Weren’t Abovyan and Nalbandyan persecuted?
A.P.-Khorenatsi…
A.N. -I wouldn’t like to go that far. Wasn’t Tumanyan being persecuted? So were Metsarents and Charents. Sevak was being gloated, Matevosyan… You know this is not a very surprising thing and sometimes it can be useful for literature. The fame of many of the writers was conditioned by the struggles of the given times. We have the same picture now. It would be wrong to connect the indifference of the society to the modern writers with the internal struggle of writers. If the society doesn’t recognize its writer then it is a bad society. Of course it is not a difficult thing to blame the unhealthy society. But it is not quite realistic to assume that for the people, who have so many social issues and need to buy bread, would go to book stores to seek for new authors.
A.P. -It is not the guilt of the person to become sick. The same can be said about the society. If it is sick it needs to be cured.
– If you mean by reading literature, who would you recommend to read for that purpose as experts of literature?
A.P. -The person eats when he is hungry. It is wrong to drag the person to the sandwich and make him eat that. Literature is spiritual nourishment and the person has to feel the need. There should be a tradition to represent literature. It is both easy and hard. It is easy because we have specialists who would be able to worthily present the literature and the writers. The society should recognize its writers. At present the image of writers is bad clothes, unshaved, sad. It is not quite like that.
A.N. -During the past one-two months a great deal of Armenian literature was translated and looked up on the internet. So a lot of knowledge can be learned. Especially now the internet is available to lots of people. There are numerous webpages, which present the current literature. The quality of the way of thinking of teachers should be changed. They should understand the epoch they live in. They should be able to endure the speed of time. Otherwise they will have to leave the sector. As of the image of the writers they are no more pneumonic, sad and poor. And the epoch of bohemia is way far. The current writer is polite, neat and representative. The latter is also talented and creates values.
– On the air we mainly see writers above the age 50, 60 years old despite the fact that most of the writers create in their young years – Duryan, Metsarents, Lermontov, Pushkin, Arthur Rambo. I haven’t seen any person at the age of 20, who’d accept the world as Duryan. Posthumously it happens though. Does it turn out that in order to become famous at the young age they have to die of pneumonia?
A.N. -Before overcoming the barrier of seeing the young people in the textbooks we should overcome the one that was set after Hrant Matevosyan. After him the developers of curriculums are not seeing any other writers. I am sure if they overcome this barrier the authors of textbooks will also include other authors. For example, Sergey Sarinyan, who is an author of a textbook, will do it with pleasure. As of the young writers then in the past 5-6 years we have such a group of 25-35 year old writers that we have never seen before. There are young writers, who have fans. People ask their autographs. Aram Pachyan, Karen Antashyan, Hrach Saribekyan, Mher Beyleryan, Hasmik Simonyan, Ashot Gabrielyan are very famous in Armenia and not only on the internet.
– The fact that the young voters are not recognized or people don’t have the time to recognize them has other reasons as well. The world literature offers such pieces that you won’t be able to manage reading during the whole lifetime.
A.N. -This is the least favorite topic of mine. When you ask people why don’t you read Hrach Saribekyan or others they answer that they read foreign literature. When you aks them what are you reading now they are not able to name at least two authors.
A.P. -They say Umberto Echo, Paolo Coelho…
A.N. -Or they say Balzac. They is contemptuous attitude to our literature. Hrach Saribekyan has published a part of his novel on www.granish.org, which can be easily compared with any modern foreign literature pieces. There is simply one stereotype. If the writer is Russian or Serbian then the book should be better than of the Armenian authors.
A.P. -Over the time the understanding of certain phenomena may change. And the same can be said about textbooks. So the same books cannot be used for 10 years over and over again. The textbooks should often be refreshed. For example, the understating of the context of “Gigor” should be presented in a right way. So how should Gigor be taught? What should be done to make the contemporary student understand that? How will Ruzan drama be understood today? If in the past the students before entering universities knew the Samvel of Raffi or Samvel’s Raffi now know neither Raffi nor Samvel.
A.N. -I repeat one more time the student shouldn’t remain back in the centuries.
– There is no question of staying in this or other century. When you read Shakespeare you appear in the 16th century. There is modern literature and classical literature. When the reader has questions without response and is able to find the answers in the ancient era or 19th century what’s wrong with that?
A.N. -It is not excluded. But the current life and the literature are processes. What’s valuable in one period may become invaluable in the next period. We should be able to provide comparisons for the readers so they could differentiate the good from the bad. We should be able to form the taste of the young generation.
A.P. -And besides the modern student has a concrete issue. He should understand why to read this or other piece. And it is the task of the teacher to explain that by recognizing the literature you may be able to change the quality of your life by making it better.
A.N. -for example, Levon B from Kilikia Armenia was not adopting any obligatory laws. He only supported the development of culture. He was personally ordering manuscripts. And when the culture and art developed people in Kilikia started to think about the development of their motherland. If today we had the most powerful army in the world but where we’d have apathy and amoral values, nothing will protect us from foreign hazards. But we always had the opposite precedent. We were able to protect our fatherland with a small army. So was the Karabakh war.