Silva Kaputikyan

Silva Kaputikyan (Armenian: Սիլվա Կապուտիկյան; 20 January 1919 – 25 August 2006) was an Armenian poet and political activist. One of the best-known Armenian writers of the twentieth century, she is recognized as "the leading poetess of Armenia" and "the grand lady of twentieth century Armenian poetry". Although a member of the Communist Party, she was a noted advocate of Armenian nationalist causes. She bridged the gap between nationalism and communism.

Her first collection of poems were published in the mid-1940s. By the 1950s she had established herself as a significant literary figure in Soviet Armenia. Besides Armenian she also wrote in Russian and many of her works were translated to other languages. In the later Soviet period she frequently addressed political and other issues.

Biography

Background and early life

Born Sirvard Kaputikyan on 20 January 1919 to parents from the historically Armenian-populated city of Van (in Western Armenia, present-day Turkey), she was raised in Yerevan, the Armenian capital. Her father, Barunak, was a member of the nationalist Dashnaktsutyun party and died of cholera three months before her birth. She was raised by her mother and grandmother. She attended the Faculty of Armenian PhilologyYerevan State University from 1936 and graduated in 1941, and subsequently studied at the Gorky Institute of World Literature of the Soviet Academy of Sciences from 1949 to 1950. She joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1945.