About The Poet

Gourgen Mahari
(1903-1969)

Gourgen Mahari was born in Van and during the massacres escaped to eastern Armenia, where he spent his late childhood in orphanages. He later attended Yerevan State University. His poetry began appearing in 1917. Several volumes later he was established as a strong lyric voice. During the Stalinist purges he was jailed for nationalistic tendencies (references to his home and childhood). He was exiled to Siberia until 1953. His experiences and suffering in the concentration camps are described with wit and dark humor in the novel Blossoming Barbed Wires. This work has been compared to Solzhenytsin's novels. Besides poetry, he wrote several other novels and a book of memories.