Armenian Poet Razmik Davoyan died in Yerevan today, on 11 January, at the age of 81.

Razmik Davoyan was born on 3 July, 1940, in the village Mets Parni, of Spitak region, Armenian SSR.

He studied philology and history at Armenian State Pedagogical University.

He published a number of poetry collections (My world, 1963; Massacre of the Crosses, 1972; The Sad Elephant, 1978). His poem “Requiem” (1969) is dedicated to the darkest pages of the history of the Armenian people. Davoyan’s famous poems include “Unwrap your skin”, “The Spider”, and “After Narekatsi”.

In 1971 he received the Prize of Armenian Komsomol. In 1986 he received Armenia’s State Prize for Literature. From 1994 to 1996 he was the head of the Writers Union of Armenia. A year later, he was the recipient of the Order of St. Mesrop Mashtots from the President of Armenia. In 2003, The Little Bird at the Exhibition, a children’s book written by Davoyan, was awarded the President’s Prize for Literature.

Davoyan’s works were subject to censorship by Soviet authorities. Requiem, Massacre of the Crosses, and Toros Rosslin were blocked from publication for a number of years, the latter two eventually being published outside of Armenia.

Much of his work has been translated into English, Russian, and Czech.