Culture

Bradbury’s famous dystopia among Yerevan bestsellers

The ‘Yerevan Bestseller’ project initiated by Armenpress brings the top ten bestselling books of Yerevan every week.

Edgar Harutyunyan’s ‘Unfound Chamomiles’ is this week’s bestselling book of Yerevan. This is the second book of the author. ‘Unfound Chamomiles’ is about human relationship, love, friendship and betrayal.

Mark Aren’s ‘Where Wild Roses Bloom’ is ranked 2nd. The story describes the inner world of an Armenophobic Turkish former serviceman, when he, already an old man, suddenly hears a lullaby song that reminds him of his mother and later finds out that the song is in Armenian: realizing his parents were Armenians. He spends his remaining life searching the graves of his parents, without knowing that it was a misunderstanding.

‘The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas’ this week is ranked 3rd. It is a 2006 Holocaust novel by Irish novelist John Boyne.

Stefan Zweig’s ‘Collected Stories’ comes next. Zweig was an Austrian novelist, playwright, journalist and biographer. At the height of his literary career, in the 1920s and 1930s, he was one of the most popular writers in the world. The book was translated by Ara Arakelyan and Margarit Arakelyan.

Nobel Prize Laureate Svetlana Alexievich’s ‘The Last Witnesses’ is 5th. Alexievich is a Belarusian investigative journalist and non-fiction prose writer who writes in Russian. She was awarded the 2015 Nobel Prize in Literature “for her polyphonic writings, a monument to suffering and courage in our time”. She is the first writer from Belarus to receive the award.

‘The Alchemist’ by Brazilian writer Paulo Coelho is 6th.Originally written in Portuguese, it became an international bestseller translated into some 70 languages as of 2016. An allegorical novel, The Alchemist follows a young Andalusian shepherd in his journey to Egypt, after having a recurring dream of finding treasure there.

‘Dandelion Wine’, 1957 novel by Ray Bradbury this week is ranked 7th. The novel is taking place in the summer of 1928 in the fictional town of Green Town, Illinois, based upon Bradbury’s childhood home of Waukegan, Illinois. It was translated from English by Zaven Boyadjyan.

Oscar Wilde’s ‘The Picture of Dorian Gray’ is ranked 8th in the bestselling list of the week. Several weeks ago it was the leader of the list.

‘Fahrenheit 451’ by Ray Bradbury comes next. Fahrenheit 451 is a dystopian novel published in 1953. It is regarded as one of his best works. The novel presents a future American society where books are outlawed and “firemen” burn any that are found. The title refers to the temperature that Bradbury understood to be the autoignition point of paper.

‘Flowers for Algernon’ by David Keyes concludes this week’s list. The short story, written in 1958 and first published in the April 1959 issue of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, won the Hugo Award for Best Short Story in 1960.

Bookinist, Hay Girk and Zangak bookstores took part in the survey.

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