Description
Book SynopsisThis book offers a monograph on the work of the Armenian poet Daniel Varuzhan (1884-1915), preceded by a general account of how Armenian national philology unfolded in the 19th century, under the influence of European orientalist philology and its two main inventions: the native and mythological religion.
Trade Review"Marc Nichanian gives us the most extensive account of philology to date - by which I mean that he calls it to account as no one else has as of yet. He identifies philology as the foundational discourse that, hardly limited to the academy, instituted the "order of things" within which we live and think still. Philology's role was memorably traced by Foucault, while Edward Said crucially implicated it in the history of colonial rule. Nichanian expands on both, and he does so by restoring religion to its place. More important, whereas Foucault and Said saw literature as the site of a possible breach of philology's hold, Nichanian demonstrates the more complex, indeed, essential link between the aesthetic and the religious. Finally, by placing mourning at the center of these distinct discursive spheres, Nichanian brings together the emerging discourses and practices of "art, religion and philology," archaeology, ethnography and literature, nationalism and colonialism. He thereby recasts our entire understanding of modernity as the impossibility of mourning. This extraordinary book, subtly argued, wonderfully organized, and impeccably translated, will no doubt appeal to scholars of literature, philosophy and religion." -- -Gil Anidjar Columbia University
Table of ContentsA Note on Transliteration Introduction. Art, Religion, and Philology (Translated by G. M. Goshgarian) Part I. "The Seal of Silence" (Translated by G. M. Goshgarian) 1. Variants and Facets of the Literary erection 2. Abovean and the Birth of the Native 3. Orientalism and Neo-archeology Part II. Daniel Varuzhan: The End of Religion (Translated by Jeff Fort) 4. The Disaster of the Native 5. The Other Scene of Representation 6. Erection and Self-Sacrifice 7. The Mourning of Religion I 8. The Mourning of Religion II Epilogue. Nietzsche in Armenian Literature at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (Translated by G. M. Goshgarian) Appendices: Translations 1. Philology and Ethnography in the Nineteenth Century (Translated by G. M. Goshgarian) 2. Constant Zarian: Essays in Mehyan and Other Writings (Translated by G. M. Goshgarian) 3. Daniel Varuzhan: Poems and Prose (Translated by G. M. Goshgarian, Nanor Kebranian, and Lena Takvorian) Notes Bibliography Index
