Mikayel Hovhannisian - Varandian
22 April , 1935
Varandian was born in Karabagh, in Varanda, from which his pseudonym is derived. He attended the diocesan school of Shoushi and thereafter studied social sciences and philosophy at several German universities, then graduated from the University of Geneva.
Varandian lived mainly in Geneva and Paris and was a member of the Droshak editorial team and a party administrator and archivist.
At the ARF’s Fourth World Congress (1904) he was elected a member of the party’s Western Bureau.
As the main theoretician/ideologist of the ARF, Varandian represented Dashnaktsoutiun at the Second (Socialist) International, attending its Copenhagen conference in 1910. He also cultivated links with European socialist leaders of the day.
During independence, he was elected to the Parliament of the Armenian Republic. He served as Armenia’s ambassador to Italy from 1918 to 1920.
Varandian was a prolific writer. Among his books are The Prehistory of the Armenian Movement, Currents, Protest in Recent History, The Reawakening Homeland and Our Role, Dashnaktsoutiun and its Adversaries, Simon Zavarian, Mourad, and other works, in particular his two-volume History of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation.
Varandian died in France of a heart attack. He was 60 years old.