Mkrtich Armen

Mkrtich Harutyunyan , known by the pen name Mkrtich Armen (; December 14, 1906 in Alexandropol – December 22, 1972 in Yerevan) was a Soviet and Armenian writer and poet.

Biography Armen was born in Alexandropol (modern-day Gyumri) to a family of artisans originating from Constantinople. During his childhood and early youth he experienced personal losses and economic hardship. After the death of his father in 1917, his mother had to leave Armen to a local orphanage, where he spent most of his youth. In the orphanage he became a reader of the Armenian socialist journal Murch (“The Hammer”) and the publications of Armenian Futurists. In spite of the work's distinct emphasis on socialist internationalism, Stalinist censors banned the book one year upon publication arguing that it “promotes local nationalism and encourages a turn toward the feudal East".

His novels and short stories made him famous both in his native Armenia and in the wider Soviet Union. His magnum opus is the 1935 novel Heghnar aghbyur (The Fountain of Heghnar), which was later made into a film. He fell out of favor with the authorities, was deported to Siberia, and later released. He published an account of camp life in 1964 and died eight years later in Yerevan.