ANTONIA ARSLAN, VARTAN MATIOSSIAN TO PRESENT ARMENIAN TRANSLATION OF THE BOOK OF MUSH

On Friday October 10, Armenian-Italian writer Antonia Arslan will present the Armenian translation of one of her most acclaimed works—The Book of Mush (Մշոյ գիրքը), alongside the translator, Dr. Vartan Matiossian, the Prelacy’s Executive Director and scholar. 

The event at St. Sarkis Church in Douglaston, New York, will introduce to the community the fabled story of one of the most treasured relics of Armenian heritage: the 13th-century Homiliary of Mush. Set in June 1915, during the Armenian Genocide, the novel follows five survivors fleeing their destroyed village in the Mush valley after the devastation wrought by the Ottoman Third Army. Among them are three women, a man, and a child—strangers brought together by tragedy and united by a sacred mission. Against all odds, they manage to rescue the Mush Homiliary, an immense manuscript of unparalleled historical and spiritual value. As they journey through a landscape of loss and violence, the manuscript becomes both talisman and testimony, binding them together in the name of survival and remembrance.

In Arslan’s narrative, the preservation of the Mush homiliary transcends its materiality: it embodies the collective memory of a people and ignites hope for the continuity of Armenian identity in the face of annihilation.

Antonia Arslan, a retired professor of modern and contemporary Italian literature at the University of Padua, is the most celebrated Armenian-Italian writer. She gained international recognition with her novel La masseria delle allodole (The Lark Farm, 2004), which tells of the Armenian Genocide through the fate of one family and was later adapted into a feature film by the Taviani brothers. Her other works, including La strada di Smirne and Il rumore delle perle di legno, similarly blend historical tragedy with personal and collective memory, making her one of the foremost literary voices of the Armenian diaspora in Europe.

The book’s translator, Dr. Matiossian, has authored several books and articles, as well as many translations in Armenian, English, and Spanish, including The Politics of Naming the Armenian Genocide: Language, History, and ‘Medz Yeghern,’ (London: I. B. Tauris, 2022). His most recent work, The Color of Choice: The Armenians and the Politics of Race in the United States and Germany (1890–1945) (Paderborn: Brill-Schoningh, 2025) was released in July.