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"Ordinary Homeland"- this is how Narek Vardanyan, a participant in the 44-day war in Artsakh, titled his book. Narek is a 2nd-year student taking a Master’s course at the Faculty of History and Social Sciences of Armenian State Pedagogical University (ASPU).
The presentation of the book was held at the University on Tuesday, September 23. Narek started to write the book during the war, and continued it after the war and head injury. During the war, he was seriously wounded in the head and fell into a coma.
Narek’s heroes are ordinary people: his comrades-in-arms, servicemen, doctors, and other war participants. The author sometimes presented what he had seen and experienced through fictional characters, completing the image of a war participant. The book also features real heroes with real names.
Edgar Hovhannisyan, Dean of the Faculty of History and Social Sciences at ASPU, has managed to read the book. He says Narek's experiences, memories and emotions from the battlefield, concerns about his Homeland, ordinary people, their destinies and heroism, his criticism and fears, can be read in one breath.
The dean adds that this memoir-style book allows [readers] to not only hear, see, and understand the war, but also to experience it from the inside, just the way it is. He believes that this valuable book can later serve as a documentary about modern warfare, a unique analysis that will provide an opportunity to reflect, appreciate, understand problems in retrospect, and learn how to love an ordinary homeland in a slightly unusual way. "This book is a message, a sermon, an attempt to correct what has happened and been experienced and change our attitude towards the Homeland and each other,” Edgar Hovhannisyan said and thanked the author for the path he has taken and his future plans: the future historian (Narek) has decided to specialize in Historical Methods, as well as to understand current educational challenges and issues.
He thinks people should be able to appreciate the heroes living next to them: ordinary people with a heroic past who have taken a different path. Future historians, regardless of changes in values, should also feed future generations with this ideology: this is what their profession dictates.
Narek Vardanyan confesses that the book "Ordinary Homeland" is about the fallen heroes, not him. The author wrote the book after the death of three comrades-in-arms: Robert, Nver, and David. Narek says if he hadn't written about their heroes, memories about them might have been forgotten.
He says the year 2020 is a history of struggle, rather than defeat. The fallen boys proved it with their lives and deeds. "A soldier fights till the end on the battlefield and dies. What is decided and signed afterwards is not that important," Narek Vardanyan said and emphasized the importance of continuing the struggle, adding that his book is also an example of struggle. "Each of us must do patriotic deeds in our place, preserve our identity. This book is about all of us: it is about people who participated [in the war], were wounded and died. This is our history and the present, a small drop for upbringing and educating our future generations, which may help [people] become more patriotic and civic-minded," Narek added.
"Narek is Armenia that is not broken and wants to be restored. After a serious injury and long absence, he resumed his studies at ASPU this year," said Khachatur Stepanyan, Head of the Chair of World History and its Teaching Methods at ASPU. He added with pride that Narek lives by the lessons of history and perhaps in that way continues his struggle, on another battlefield, trying to bring our country back to its feet.
The historian says Narek's struggle, his unbreakable spirit, and desire to have his place in society should inspire everyone to live for the sake of the path we have taken.
The meeting was accompanied by stories about heroic episodes, and Q&A session.
