Source: media.am
Interviewer: Tigranuhi Martirosyan | Journalist, Media Promotion Specialist
Fiction and the written word are currently in fierce competition with visual media. In fact, one could say they have already lost, retreating into the realm of a marginal, exotic hobby. This is the candid admission made by writer Karen Antashyan in a conversation with Media.am. According to him, we live in an era of “superficial flights”; reels are stripping us of our most vital asset—the ability to concentrate and delve deep. People have become afraid of long films or thick novels.
In this interview, we discuss the contemporary role and functionality of literature, the evolution of libraries, and the author’s latest work.
Your collection Lav Prtsa (A Good relise) was recently published. You’ve described it as a “documentary stand-up” written in the language of a memoir. What does this mean?
To be honest, that is just one of many descriptions attempting to define the book’s fluid genre. In reality, it is a pure fictional narrative. The raw material is indeed my personal experience, but the objective is broader and purely literary.
When I say “documentary memoir,” I mean that I haven’t invented the events, but I have reinterpreted them through a dramatic chain where an everyday story suddenly becomes an unexpected encounter with the absurdity, comedy, and epic scale of reality. Generally speaking, there is no literature without personal presence; all writers, in one way or another, manipulate personal material. Here, I chose the plain-spoken format of a documentary stand-up to bring the reader—through immediacy and laughter—to a point of reconciliation with their own pain and past. Not through lamentation or philosophical conclusions, but through various “giggles” or sighs of varying intensity.
Does your experience in the book provide a broader picture of the times, social orders, customs, and your generation?
Well, generally, “having a lucky escape” is our national sport—miraculously surviving insurmountable evil is our primary mantra. However, the hero’s motive in the book is strictly to survive his own destiny. Historical events are merely background decor—secondary circumstances.
Yes, chronologically, the book covers a vast transit period from a Soviet childhood to today’s techno-consumerist reality, but I would hesitate to say it’s a totalization of an entire generation’s historical experience; that would sound too ambitious. It is rather one person’s modest attempt to document their own unnoticed history, which is left out of official annals. This isn’t done to complete those annals, but purely for self-documentation and self-recovery.
The decades of Armenian independence have become an endless transition for us, where we constantly cancel and lose the old without ever managing to formulate and truly possess the new. Time, flooding over us and accumulating, seems to remain anonymous for the individual even as it is lived. This “self-excavation” is not an act of solving a complex aesthetic problem or historical reflection; it is a very practical manual for finding oneself within the present and fighting against uncertainty and chaos. In short, the only one who truly “has a lucky escape” in the book is the protagonist.
You mentioned that you consciously avoided making historical generalizations or judgments. Were you concerned that you might be accused of distorting the historical record?
No, I had no such fear. Lav Prtsa is neither a historical drama nor an existential parable. To me, relying on the sovereignty and uniqueness of one’s own story is more honest than presenting oneself as a victim or hero of “Great Times.”
The hero of my book is a “small man,” an average citizen who doesn’t solve global problems or claim historical significance. He simply finds himself in “cringe-worthy” yet ordinary situations, while maintaining the innocence of someone experiencing something for the first time. Because if something happens to you for the first time, it has happened in the universe for the first time. He doesn’t derive parabolic conclusions or sterile truths from his life; he just takes a breath every time and says, “I got away with it; I had a lucky escape this time too.” Subjectivism isn’t a distortion—it’s the only honest way to look at the world.
Many say it’s a fragile time for modern writers; works of fiction often enter political discourse and are interpreted as literal truth. Did you experience any self-censorship in this regard?
Literature should not be afraid of being politicized, manipulated, misunderstood, or mocked—even though the writer often becomes a victim of exactly those things. In reality, the only true filter for any artist who takes their work seriously is the one that sits on their conscience like a ruthless critic, asking: “Is what I’ve done ultimately art, or not?”
Political factions love to polarize society according to their own interests and agendas, granting bonuses or using dirty targeting tactics. Writers are often ignored when they publish books and hope for a substantive discussion, but they are suddenly remembered when someone needs an “authoritative” viewpoint for a trending political discourse.
In such cases, I always remember that if you are called to take responsibility for something you have no power over, it is simply manipulation. Unfortunately, today we see how everything—including fiction—is being pressed into the service of political agendas. But the writer’s role is not activism or conformity regarding “trendy” political issues; it is to tell the stories of those aspects of human life that the political agenda doesn’t even care about. My book is not a political manifesto, but it is political by nature because it speaks of human freedom, loss, individual choice, and dignity in a system that often tries to reduce a person to a vote, a customer, a statistic, a taxpayer, or a sympathizer. Literature must speak to a person where everyone else—sociologists, political scientists, scientists, even doctors—has nothing left to say. No other field has as much power and responsibility to approach real human pain as literature does.
You said you wrote about the “most untold” times. Why do writers—and, for that matter, the press—rarely address this transitional period?
Because the last 30–40 years are still perceived within the logic of the “present continuous.” It is the time of our lives, and we—the ones who would name it—don’t want our time to be considered “the historical past” yet, because we don’t want to classify ourselves as part of the past. We are still here, living, acting; whatever we haven’t done, we are “just about” to do. Of course, it won’t stay this way. New generations are coming who don’t know that past, and sooner or later, we will start to remember and retell it in detail—partly to pass it down, and partly to boast a little.
When writing the book, did you intentionally embed any specific functions—for example, to teach critical thinking or serve an educational purpose?
No, I didn’t set any specific didactic or educational goals, and I generally don’t in my books. The era of literature broadcasting “indisputable truths” and moral postulates from a dominant, god-like, lofty authorial position is long gone. We are not working with good and evil, truth and error, or sin and atonement; we are working with uncertainty, confusion, boredom, loss, contradiction, and irrationality. In that sense, my gaze here is rather confused and contradictory—exactly like a real person in their ordinary life. And who knows? Perhaps this modest, non-categorical perspective, combined with good humor, can heal traumas more effectively than the broadcasting of philosophical, analytical, or moralistic treatises.
There are opinions that for a book not to lose out to short-form video clips, it must at least teach the reader to be critical. Do you agree?
Yes, fiction and text in general are in sharp competition with visual media today. One could even say they have already lost, becoming a marginal, exotic hobby. But the problem isn’t a lack of “criticality.” We live in an era of “superficial flights.” Reels strip us of the most important thing: the ability to concentrate and go deep. People are now afraid of long films or thick novels because it feels like they are losing time—life is moving fast, and they are falling behind. If you lose the ability to focus on one thing for a long time and penetrate its essence, you naturally lose your critical perspective as well.
Thus, good fiction has itself become an intellectual workout for the brain. Just as you train your muscles, you must train your attention and focus. Reading a book has become an essential component of self-care—something like a healthy lifestyle—to withstand the torrent of information noise pouring in from every corner, distracting us and forcing us to be reactive and superficial.
As a modern writer, is it important to you that your book is represented in libraries? Do you ensure your books are available there so that readers who cannot afford to buy them still have access?
It is important not only to be represented but for the book to live there. We must understand that old-format libraries, acting as “tombs for books,” are no longer attractive. We need modern educational and cultural hubs, like the ones I’ve seen in neighboring Georgia, for example. There are a few such projects in Armenia, but they have been private commercial ventures of modest scale.
A library should be an environment-building institution where a person goes not just to pick up a book, but to spend time, socialize, think, and live. I often communicate with my readers directly on social media, but transforming libraries at the state level is a vital necessity for our society.
Do you mean that as an author, you don’t need the library as an intermediary to stay in touch with your readers?
I don’t exclude either; both are very important. It’s just that I have no power over libraries. I can’t ensure my books are widely represented or that people are constantly checking them out. The library must be a social project, receiving support from the state and foundations. The most a writer can do is donate their books to national and public libraries, which I always do.
The reality is that in Armenia, libraries are not yet atmosphere-creating or environment-building structures; they don’t have that “charge” of educational concentration. In Georgia, for instance, there are libraries in city parks with super-modern designs—glass-walled, open, with cafes and free Wi-Fi. Libraries could have a massive impact as educational, community-building hubs. It’s clear that the old way is no longer appealing. We need to think of new models to engage people in that environment, and it will certainly work.
