Patkanyan, Rafael Gabrielovich

Pseudonym - Gamar-Katipa.

Armenian writer.

Born November 8 (20), 1830, in the city of Nakhichevan-on-Don. Studied in Lazarevsky Institute in Moscow, in Universities of Derpt (now Tartu) and St. Petersburg. Published since 1850. in 1855-1857, published literature collections Gamar-Katipa, in which publicized his patriotic poetry. IN late 1860s, returned to his hometown and started pedagogic activities. In the works of 1850s-1860s - poems Tears of the Araks, Song of Agasi's Motherё historic poem Death of Vardan Mamikonyan the Brave (1856), and others - tired to awaken the national self-consciousness of the Armenian nation. Created examples of the civil poetry in the period of the Russo-Turkish War 1877-1878 (a poem cycle Free Songs, 1878). Published a collection of satiric poetry The Lyre of the New Nakhichevan (1879). By depicting the images of the Armenian people's tragic life under the Turkish yoke, appealed to the unification of the nation in the struggle for liberty and expressed the people's aspiration to obtain the liberation with Russia's help. In the stories Open Yard (1874), War (1877), and Walking Cadavers (1889), unmasked the greed of the merchant bourgeoisie and clergy. The stories Ambitious Man (1880) and The Mistress and the Maid (1884) are dedicated to the youth.

Died on August 22 (September 3), 1892, in Nakhichevan-on-Don.