Batiashvili Guram

Guram Batiashvili (b. January 10, 1938, Kula, Samtredia Municipality) is a playwright, Honored Artist of Georgia (1987), member of the boards of the World Jewish Congress (1991) and the World Zionist Organization (1993).

He graduated from the Faculty of Oriental Studies of Tbilisi State University (1962). In 1965–1967, he worked in the “Literature Newspaper”, starting from 1984, he was the editor of the magazine “Theatre and Life” and from 1993, he published the newspaper “Menorah”. Batiashvili published his first critical letter in 1962 in the magazine “Mnatobi”.

He dedicated his first play Dzakhili (staged in the theatres of Gori and Chiatura in 1969) to the contemporary youth. The documentary drama Four Days of Kote Marjanishvili (staged in the Batumi Drama Theatre in 1972), Lali, Love and Others (staged in the Nikolai Gogol Theatre in Moscow in 1976), The Debt (staged in the theatres of Kutaisi and Rustavi in 1978), Conspiracy (1832) (staged in the theatres of Sokhumi, Poti and Tbilisi), Death of the Village (1985) are also worth mentioning; He published the plays Four Days (1972), After the Vespers (1975), The Debt (1980), Letters to Children (1988) as separate collections.

His books Tributaries (1977) and Trace (1985) were dedicated to the problems of modern literature and theatre. Batiashvili translated the works of N. Hikmet, A. Nesin, M. Shatrov, Sabahattin Ali and others. The book The Sun in the Clouds was awarded the prize of the Council of Ministers of Georgia (1990).

Literary works: თუ დაგივიწყო, იერუშალიმ (რომანი), თბ., 1991; შეთქმულება, თბ., 1992; ვარ დარაჯი ჩემი ძმისა, თბ., 1996; სახეები და სიტუაციები (დრამატურგის ჩანაწერები, თბ., 2017; ელიგულა და ხავა, თბ., 2017; საქართველოს ბედისწერა (დოკუმენტური ტრილოგია–16.  2007, იქვე), თბ., 2018.