Awakening: The First English Translation of Malkhas’s Classic Novel ”Zartonk” is Published

Awakening: The First English Translation of Malkhas’s Classic Novel ‘Zartonk’ is Published –

Sardarabad bookstore (Glendale) and Sosé and Allen’s Legacy Foundation are excited to present the first English-language translation of Malkhas’s classic four-part work, Zartonk (Awakening), an Armenian novel published in Boston, Massachusetts in 1933. Translated by Simon Beugekian,Awakening is a project over three years in the making. With your help, we hope to bring it to its finish line.

The novel tells a fascinating story of collective revival and captures the struggles and triumphs of Armenians living across three empires. At the turn of the twentieth century, as the map of the world was redrawn and the Ottoman Empire crumbled, Armenians committed themselves to a struggle toward self-determination and to rousing their compatriots from their centuries-long slumber of servitude. Awakening tells the tale of a cast of men and women, who both shaped and weathered the events that would redefine an entire people. The story, which spans two decades, is a fictional narrative written by a man who was an activist and an organizer in the Armenian revolutionary movement. As such, Awakening is a historical novel deeply rooted in actual events, and offers a fresh, critical, and intimate glance into the heart of the great changes that swept the world, including Armenia, a hundred years ago, and that still define our world today.

Following its initial publication in 1933, Zartonk was reproduced in serial form and reprinted in various diaspora communities. Over the course of its many publication runs, Zartonk became a household staple and an emblematic piece of popular literature for generations of Armenians growing up in diasporic communities. The novel’s action-filled, page-turner quality, its central romantic love story, and its vivid descriptions of Armenian life in the villages of the

Editorial Director: Dr. Talar Chahinian teaches in the Department of Comparative World Literature at California State University, Long Beach. She is also the assistant editor of theArmenian Review.

Translator: Simon Beugekian is a translator now living in Los Angeles. He began his career in translation while working for the Boston-based Armenian Weekly. His most recent translation project, Karnig Panian’s memoir Goodbye, Antoura, will be published by Stanford University Press in 2015.

Creative Director: Sako Shahinian is an LA based designer who is currently the creative director of TICLA. He also is involved with many passion projects.

Editor: Dr. Carole Viers-Andronico lives and works in Paris, where she directs the academic programs at the University of California’s Paris Study Center and teaches courses in language, literature, and film. She is also a literary translator.

Publishing: Varouj Ourfalian is the Director of Sales and Programming at Sardarabad bookstore in Glendale, California. Founded by the Armenian Youth Federation in 1984, Sardarabad offers a wide collection of books that explore topics related to Armenians.

Project Coordinator: Vaché Thomassian is the Director of Sosé & Allen’s Legacy Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to continuing the works and vision of his sister and brother-in-law in Armenia and the Diaspora.