THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT OF AGASI AYVAZYAN’S NOVEL “ON THE STRUCTURE AND CREATION”
https://doi.org/10.59982/18294359-25.1-lm-14
Abstract
This article undertakes a critical analysis of the historical, ideological, and aesthetic dimensions of Agasi Ayvazyan’s novel On the Structure and Creation (Alexander Tamanyan), which reconstructs formative episodes of early 20th-century Armenian history through a fictionalized but historically grounded narrative. The text foregrounds the Armenian Genocide, the deliberate obliteration of Armenian cultural and spiritual heritage by the Ottoman Empire, the emergence of the First Republic of Armenia, and the Sovietization of the region between 1920 and 1933. These events are examined within the broader context of cultural transformation and ideological subjugation under totalitarian regimes. At the center of the narrative is the figure of architect Alexander Tamanyan, whose creative ethos and national consciousness stand in dialectical tension with the authoritarian structures that seek to instrumentalize culture as a mechanism of state ideology. The novel also reintroduces key historical figures—Alexander Miasnikyan, Martiros Saryan, and Agasi Khanjyan, Garegin Nzhdeh and others representatives — who collectively represent the intellectual and political elite navigating the complexities of post-genocide nationhood.
Equally central is the allegorical figure of the Armenian artisan, whose labor and suffering symbolize the resilience, continuity, and historical agency of the Armenian people. Ayvazyan constructs a narrative in which cultural production becomes both a site of resistance and a conduit for the preservation of collective memory. Consequently, On the Structure and Creation (Alexander Tamanyan) transcends biographical fiction to emerge as a sophisticated historiographical and philosophical inquiry into the ontological foundations of national identity, cultural sovereignty, and historical subjectivity.
Keywords: Genocide, Western Armenia, struggle for independence, USSR, exile, politics.
PAGES : 136-150