Aram Kouyoumdjian
This past fall, at a conference on “Armenian Art and Culture in the
Ottoman Empire Before 1915,” I presented a paper entitled “Arrested
Development: Western Armenian Theater in the Nineteenth Century.” The
paper examined the emergence of Western Armenian theater in
Constantinople – or “Bolis” – amidst a period of national awakening
known as “Zartonk” and of linguistic transition from classical to
vernacular Armenian.
As I delved into my research, I could not help contemplating that in
all of Los Angeles there had been two – just two – productions in
Western Armenian the whole year, and that both of them had direct links
to 19th-century Constantinople: the Krikor Satamian Theater Company’s
rendition of “Shoghokort” (The Flatterer) by Hagop Baronian was written
in that time and place, while my own revival of “Hin Asdvadzner”
(Ancient Gods) adapted an iconic work by Levon Shant, who was born in
Bolis and spent formative years there prior to the Genocide.
