Nariné Abgarian (Berd, 1971) never imagined that she would become a writer. What she was clear about was that one day she would leave her native Armenia. Her mother told her over and over again since the war broke into the calm of the country, so when she turned twenty, she packed her bags and went to Moscow. “Where she lived there was no noise except that of the cows and chickens. There were no opportunities for me and everything was unstable,” the author confessed in a conversation with her Catalan translator, Marta Nin, within the framework of the Kosmopolis festival, which is being held until next Sunday at the Center de Cultura Contemporània in Barcelona ( CCCB).
“I have never been prepared for success,” acknowledged what is considered one of the most recognized and international voices in her country. The sold-out tickets days before the talk took place demonstrate this, as does the intergenerationality and places of origin of the audience, many of whom speak Russian as their first language.
Abgarian talked about his first work adventures, which had nothing to do with letters. “I was an accountant for a long time but I was terrible.” He was like this for seven years until he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. “For three years I thought I was going to die until another doctor told me that they were wrong and that I did not have the disease. But by then I had already realized that I had to change my life to do something that really motivated me, so I started a blog.”
Little by little, his comics were gaining ground and a publisher invited him to publish. “I never imagined that readers would have so much interest in the little Armenia I come from. I think the key is my sincerity, which is transmitted to the reader. Or at least that’s what I try to do,” he confessed.
Although Abgarian writes in Russian, his prose is a tribute to the Armenian oral tradition, as demonstrated in works such as And Three Apples Fell from the Sky (Navona/Comanega)—a fable that captures the idiosyncrasy of a small community— or the recent El mar terra endins (Comanegra), which begins with the meeting of four women at the funeral of the man they all loved.
Of course, “in order to talk about my country of origin it was necessary to distance myself. I couldn’t do it until I lived abroad and, in fact, during the periods that I live there I am unable to pick up a pencil. I then take the opportunity to store emotions that I will later put on paper.”
‘Now that you no longer live in Moscow, can you then write about the war with Ukraine?’ Nin asked. “Don’t know. Time has to pass. But if I ever address this topic, it will be to talk about the anonymous people who experience horror and who, despite everything, try to move on,” she confesses. He will surely use the magical realism that characterizes him so much since it allows him to “speak about reality from afar. Something that I learned from Gabriel García Márquez,” she concluded.
