The Fool (Խենթը, Khenté, Armenian pronunciation:[χɛntʰə]) is an 1880 Armenian language novel by the Armenian novelist Raffi, one of the best-known novels by one of Armenia's greatest novelists.[1] The plot is based on the last Russo-Turkish War (1877–78), the plot tells a romance set against the background of the divided Armenian nation.
The novel was translated into Russian and published in 2006.[2]
The novel is set in three districts near the border between the Russian and Ottoman Empires: Bayazit, Alashkert, and Vagharshapat.
The novel opens with four fast-paced chapters describing the Turkish siege of Bayazit, an historic episode from the last Russo-Turkish war.[3] After a harrowing depiction of the battle, its outcome is left in suspense as chapter five suddenly shifts the focus to an earlier time to tell the story of a village in Alashkert and a romance caught in the treacherous sociopolitical crosscurrents of the war. The succeeding twenty-nine chapters present a rich ethnographic account of country life in this particular region of Western Armenia, while depicting the ideological themes that dominated Armenian life at the time through a set of powerful, competing actors. The novel concludes in Vagharshapat [Etchmiadzin].
The French translation was completed by Mooshegh Abrahamian as Le fou : Conséquences tragiques de la guerre russo-turque de 1877-1878 en Arménie in 2009.[4]
