Mischa Kudian, writer, translator, painter and dentist, specialised in English renderings of choice pieces from Armenian literature for which he set up the imprint Mashtots Press in the early 1970s. For over 20 years Kudian published his own retellings and translations of Armenian folk tales and the national epic David of Sassoun, as well as translations from Gregory of Narek (10 th century), an anthology of Soviet Armenian poetry and selected works from Hovannes Toumanian, Avetik Issahakian, Hagop Baronian and Shahan Shahnour. His translation of Vahan Totovents’s Scenes from an Armenian Childhood was an outstanding literary success. After Kudian’s death in 1997, the imprint fell into abeyance and the Armenian Institute is pleased to announce that it has now acquired the imprint and all its associated rights from Mischa Kudian’s heirs.
