Derenik Demirchian (originally Demirchoghlian) was born on February 18, 1877, in Akhalkalaki in the region of Javakheti in southern Georgia, then a part of the Russian Empire.

In 1892, he was accepted into the Gevorgian Seminary in Etchmiadzin, where he was taught by the poet Hovhannes Hovhannisyan, who influenced Demirchian's views on literature.

[1] While at the seminary, he became familiar with world literature, reading authors such as Lermontov, Pushkin, Tolstoy, Goethe, Heine, Byron, and Shakespeare.

[1] Demirchian began his literary career as a poet, publishing his first poem, titled "Apagan" (The future), in the journal Taraz (Dress) in 1893.

According to S. Hovhannisian, the Russian Revolution of 1905-1907 marked a turning point in Demirchian's career, after which he focused on "becoming spiritually closer to the people."

[4] In Kevork Bardakjian's view, Demirchian succeeded in "creating a remarkably witty comedy" by elaborating on the simple plot of the folk tale.

[1] Several of Demirchian's plays from the 1930s, such as Fosforayin shogh (Phosphoric ray, 1932), Napoleon Korkotyan (1934) and Kaputan (1938) deal with the socio-economic transformations in the Soviet Union at that time.

In 1938, Demirchian wrote Yerkir hayreni (Fatherland), a drama about the 11th-century Armenian king Gagik II and his struggle with the Byzantines.

[4] Demirchian's most notable work is Vardanank (parts 1 and 2, 1943–46, revised ed., 1951), a monumental patriotic novel about the 5th-century Armenian Christian rebellion led by Vardan Mamikonian against Sasanian Iran.

[2] In the last years of his life, Demirchian wrote a novel about the inventor of the Armenian alphabet titled Mesrop Mashtots, which remained incomplete.