Ringing under Control: The Soviet Translation of Paruyr Sevak’s The Unsilenceable Belfry

Abstract

The article offers a comparative study of the 1982 Russian translation of Paruyr Sevak’s The Unsilenceable Belfry by Harold Registan, examining it in relation to the Armenian original published in 1959. It primarily focuses on the mechanisms of Soviet censorship at the level of translation. Although the poem addresses the life of Komitas Vardapet, it is profoundly rooted in the memory of the 1915 Armenian Genocide, a subject that remained politically sensitive throughout much of the Soviet period. The study argues that the significant delay in translating the poem into Russian reflects the ideological caution surrounding genocide discourse and national memory within the Soviet Union. Through close textual analysis, the article demonstrates how the translation systematically softens or reframes elements considered ideologically problematic. Ethnic references are generalized, religious symbolism is secularized and direct accusatory language, particularly the explicit use of the term “genocide,” is either mitigated or carefully repositioned. Entire sections that foreground independent national resilience or religious continuity are omitted. These interventions do not obscure the central theme of the poem but shift its semantic and ideological emphasis. The study suggests that translation functioned as both a means of disseminating national literature across the Soviet Union and a mechanism of ideological control. By mediating Armenian historical memory through Russian, Soviet authorities were able to influence how that memory circulated and how explicitly it could be articulated. The case of The Unsilenceable Belfry is a vivid example of how translation practices operated within the ideological framework of the late Soviet period.