Death of Krikor Chahinian (February 15, 2009)

Krikor Chahinian was a distinguished figure in pedagogy and culture in the Armenian Diaspora during the 1960s–2000s. 

He was born in Damascus in 1930. He received his primary education at the Sahakian National School and at the French school of the Marist Brothers. He moved to Beirut in 1945 with his family and attended the Nishan Palandjian Lyceum. He graduated in 1949 and taught there from 1950 to 1952. He then went to Belgium, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in the fields of philology and pedagogy from the Université Libre of Brussels and a teaching degree in 1956. 

Upon returning to Lebanon, he carried out an extensive pedagogical and literary career for the next half century. He continued his teaching career at the Nishan Palandjian Lyceum (1956–1987), as well as at the Marist Brothers’ School, the Haigazian College, and the Zarehian Seminary (1999–2007). In 1966, he founded the cultural and literary quarterly journal Ahegan, where he was the editor-in-chief until 1970. 

From 1970 to 1994, he taught French literature at the Lebanese University. During the 1990s, he conducted short courses devoted to Western Armenian literature at Yerevan State University, Artsakh State University, and the American University of Armenia, and also taught Armenian language courses within the framework of the Venice Summer Program. 

In 1979, Krikor Chahinian defended a doctoral dissertation on the works of Shahan Shahnour at the Department of Literature of the University of Paris, and again in 1994 at Yerevan State University. 

He was the founding director of the “Khacher Kaloustian” Pedagogical Center of the Catholicosate of the Great House of Cilicia (1987-2007) and the director of the archives of the Catholicosate (1998-2003). Drawing on archival materials, he published Shavarsh Nartuni’s Diary of Exile (2000) and Correspondence between Three Catholicoi of the Great House of Cilicia and Khoren I Muradbekian, Catholicos of All Armenians (2002). 

Chahinian collaborated with numerous Armenian daily newspapers and literary journals and published many articles in literary criticism. He is the author of monographs devoted to Hamasdegh (1961), Gurgen Mahari (1964), Levon Shant (1967), and Shahan Shahnour (1981, 1985); the collections of critical essays Selection (1962) and Encounters (1966); volumes presenting Armenian literature in French, Panorama de la littérature arménienne (1980) and Œuvres vives de la littérature arménienne (1988); and Recapitulation: A Memoir (2004). He also published pedagogical works: Way How to Teach Armenian Language and Literature (1995), Way How to Teach Armenian History (2002), and A Handbook for Improving Armenian (2006). 

He translated numerous volumes from French and adapted works of children’s literature. In 1984, he published a French-language volume of Shahan Shahnour’s short stories. 

He also authored the Armenian–French Practical Dictionary (1997) and the French–Armenian Practical Dictionary, prepared in collaboration with Haroutioun Kurkjian (1998). The latter was followed in 2000 by the French–Armenian–French Combined Dictionary. 

Krikor Chahinian was awarded the Mesrop Mashdots Medal of the Catholicosate of the Great House of Cilicia. He passed away in Beirut on February 15, 2009.