Vahan Totovents’s novel “Life on the Old Roman Road” has been translated into Romanian
Last week, Ararat Publishing House of the Union of Armenians of Romania released the Romanian version of Vahan Totovents’s famous novel “Life on the Old Roman Road” (Vahan Totovenţ, Viaţa per vechiul drum roman, Editura Ararat, 2017, 159 pp.). As reported Hayern Aysor, the Romanian version was translated by well-known Romanian-Armenian journalist, writer and translator, member of the Unions of Writers of Romania and Armenia Madeleine Karacașian.
Madeleine Karacașian was born in 1934 into a family of a migrant in the Romanian city of Krayova. She received a musical education and has worked as a correspondent for various Romanian radio shows and dozens of Romanian newspapers, journals and magazines, touching upon Armenian culture and great Armenians and her trips to Armenia several times. She has also worked in the editorial offices of Ararat and New Life weeklies of Bucharest and as a correspondent for Voice of the Homeland.
Madeleine Karacașian started translating in Armenian, French and English in 1982. She has translated the works of Alexander Shirvanzade, Avetik Isahakyan, Metakse, Karine Khodikyan, Davit Muradyan, Alexander Topchyan and Elda Green, as well as the works of over ten authors for the Anthology of Contemporary Armenian Prose”. She has also translated the novel “Summer Without Dawn” by Hakob Khachikyan and Jean-Yves Sousi and Hakob Khachikyan’s novel “The Coasts of Destiny”, as well as Richard Baldouchi’s book “Charles Aznavour: Confessions of a Son of Boheme” from French.
Over the past quarter of a century, Sargis Selyan, Meline Poladyan and Arpiar Sahakyan have translated the works of Armenian authors (Raffi, Hovhannes Tumanyan, Paruyr Sevak, Vardges Petrosyan, Aghasi Ayvazyan, Vano Siradeghyan and Grigor Babayan) into Romanian. Poet Anahit Nersesyan has translated Armenian folk verses from French into Romanian.
Thanks to these translations, some works of Armenian authors are available for Romanian readers. As for the rich Romanian literature, which particularly thrived in the 19th-20th centuries, is unknown to Armenian readers, except for rare translations. In 1939, Hakob Siruni translated the volume of poems of Romanian poet Mihay Eminesku, and in 2012, Sargis Selyan translated Varujan Vosganian’s novel “The Book of Whispers” into Armenian.
Novelists Stefan Hakobyan and Varujan Vosganian, as well as writers and publicists Petros Khorasanjyan and Vardan Arakelyan are among the well-known and contemporary literary figures in Romania.