Ara Baliozian: Ways and means

[MJ]

NOTES & COMMENTS

***************************************

To Armenians who demand solutions from me

and choose to ignore the solutions advanced by our historians and writers

from Khorenatsi and Yeghishe in the 5th century AD to our own days,

I can only say:

As long as there are Armenians like you,

our problems will remain insoluble.

If I know my Armenians,

they will never come to terms with their enemies:

too much blood.

Hell, they will never even come to terms with their fellow Armenians:

too much bad blood!

 

Whenever I express an anti-ARF or an anti-Anteliassagan opinion,

I am thought of as a Ramgavar or an Etchmiadznagan,

and vice versa,

even though I have openly declared myself to be an anti-partisan atheist

whose motto happens to be:

"If you can loathe both sides for the same money,

why settle for one?"

 

I don’t believe in inspiration.

I believe in stimulation,

and nothing stimulates me more than unfair criticism.

 

A note on capitalism and fascism:

both are expressions of greed, of money and power respectively;

and of the two,

greed for power has proven to be far more dangerous.

 

Only fools brag.

Decent men are, as a rule, too busy trying to maintain their decency

in a crooked world to have time to brag.

I don’t remember to have met a single decent Armenian

who bragged about his Armenianism.

But I have met quite a few windbags with single-digit IQs

who bragged about their moral and intellectual superiority.

 

The very same people

who raise the same phony questions again and again

also accuse me of repeating myself

whenever I take the trouble to answer them.

 

Great nations need big lies;

small nations need bigger lies.

 

Fool: anyone who is easily seduced by the strength of his own arguments.

 

People who ignore good advice

have no right to say

"What was bound to happen, happened!"

or "It was written!" or

"It was God’s will!"

 

It is an unfortunate fact that some people

tend to confuse kindness and civility with weakness.

I hate rude people and I hate being rude.

But what I hate even more is being intimidated

or shouted down by garbage-mouth bullies.

 

Patriotic poetry has as much appeal to me as

patriotic music, patriotic art, and patriotic science.

Frankly, I’d rather watch a TV commercial

than read our patriotic poets:

at least TV commercials seldom last more than a few seconds.

 

There is money in flattering idiots, especially wealthy idiots.

There is no money in calling them idiots.

 

I wish I were a good actor

so that I could drive my enemies nuts by pretending to love them.

 

To be brief is an art.

To be long-winded is a collection of vices

ranging from arrogance and laziness

to narcissism and contempt for others.

 

To express a political view

does not make one a pundit

in the same way that

to take an aspirin does not make one a doctor.

 

There is common sense and there is common humbug

and of the two

the second is much more universally distributed.

 

He who brags will insult and threaten.

The secret ambition of every windbag

is to be a fire-breathing dragon.

 

Why is it that

whenever one of our eminent authors

writes an honest book

he is eager to inform everyone that

it will be published only posthumously?

 

--------------------

 

ara baliozian

 

P.S. Ara's original text has not been altered. Just some formatting has been performed. -MJ

 

[ April 04, 2001: Message edited by: MJ ]

[MJ]

PRESENT COMPANY SUSPECTED

*************************************

Nothing comes more naturally to an Armenian than to look down at a fellow Armenian and to give him unsolicited advice; and if you were to ask, "Isn’t that what you do too?" I will say, that’s what all writers do; and if you were to ask, "Who authorized you to be a writer?" I will say, that’s the very same question that a Soviet judge once asked Joseph Brodsky, and that’s not a question but an insult ("Who the hell do you think you are?") and a threat ("If you don’t shut up we will make you!"). And sure enough, after spending a number of years in the Gulag, Brodsky was thrown out of the country and was later awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

Moral: To say or imply that the social order we have created is so perfect that it has no use for critics or dissidents is a statement worthy of a philistine, a fascist, and an idiot…but I repeat myself.

 

--------------------

 

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

AN ANECDOTE

*************************

"Why do you complain so much?" one of our high-ranking bureaucrats once demanded to know. "Do you think you are the only writer who has been treated badly?"

"No, of course not!" I replied. "That is why I speak with the strength of many."

He said nothing, but I could sense that he would have preferred if I had kept my mouth shut, dug a hole in the ground, crawled into it, and buried myself alive.

Moral:

No one likes to be told "You are wrong!"

If you are right, you get angry.

If you are wrong and didn’t know it, you get angrier.

And if you were wrong and knew it,

you want to kill the bastard who dared to expose you.

 

--------------------

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

MUMBO JUMBO

****************************

When I analyze and diagnose our ills,

I refuse to behave like a jungle medicine man, the kind who prepares a concoction made of elephant dung, crocodile tears and cobra venom (or so he says to give his backyard manure more class), mutters incantations, emits grunts, chants, dances, after which he tells you to go home and you have nothing to worry about.

 

In the West, things are done differently.

The doctor comes right out and says you have cancer and your chances are 50/50 (that’s what happened to my mother 28 years ago);

and if your death wish is stronger than your urge to live, you succumb and die of fear.

My mother is now 87 and she lives!

--------------------

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

MORONS & OXYMORONS

*****************************************

Regardless of the severity of a crime,

a good lawyer will never run out of arguments

in defending his client.

The same applies to our partisans

who confuse ideology with theology.

In their view the party is never wrong;

and to prove their point

they assert their honesty and patriotism.

They forget that

an honest political party is an oxymoron,

and patriotism is not a hammer

with which to break skulls,

especially not the skulls of fellow Armenians

who may well be as "honest" and "patriotic" as they are.

Speaking for myself,

like most men with a minimum of common sense,

I have a tendency to mistrust a charlatan’s claim of honesty,

a megalomaniac’s assessment of himself,

and a dupe’s claim of superior wisdom.

--------------------

 

 

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

P/R=B/S

**************************

What could be more innocuous than trying to make a good impression? And yet, if you consider the consequences and ramifications you may begin to entertain second thoughts.

As I see it, the first problem with thinking in terms of making a positive or favorable impression is that you automatically or perhaps even unconsciously assume everyone else is doing the same thing, that is, misrepresenting himself to some degree; and what is misrepresentation if not a form of deception? And the problem with deceivers is that they assume speaking the truth is a luxury beyond their means, perhaps even an act of aggression if not against individuals than against accepted modes of conduct.

Result? A culture that swims in a sea of inflated commercial claims, propaganda, rhetoric, partisan verbiage, public-relation stunts and lies whose cumulative aim is the exploitation of the underdog by top dog; and what is exploitation if not using man not as an end but as a means to an end, a selfish aim (such as the acquisition of prestige, wealth and power) and power in the hands of a deceiver means oppression, injustice, tyranny, violations of fundamental human rights, and ultimately war and massacre.

Which is why, I maintain, whenever we make an effort to make a good impression, we become actors in a human comedy with an inevitable tragic denouement.

There is no merit in trying to make a good impression if deep inside we remain less than good.

--------------------

 

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

FROM THE AMEN CORNER

************************************

Again and again I have to deal with Armenians (and I am not talking about average joes but doctors, lawyers, and academics) who insult, threaten, and bully me and call it criticism. To how many of them I could say:"I have worked for Armenians long enough to know the difference between a critic and a commissar of culture,

or, for that matter, between a commissar of culture and an executioner; and you, my good friend, are neither a critic nor a commissar!" And to those who blame it all on our Ottoman or Soviet background, I say:

"My own experience tells me, there are no good guys and bad guys, only bad guys, worse guys, and their victims. If you want to change the world, begin with yourself and may the Good Lord (if He exists) have mercy on your soul (if you have one).

Amen!"

--------------------

 

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

A TOTALLY UN-ARMENIAN PROPOSAL

*******************************************

If I have had a series of negative experiences, what I write is bound to be negative. And if you have had a series of positive experiences, what you write is bound to be positive. It would be absurd of me to write as if I have had your experiences and vice versa.

 

Instead of calling each other names, let us learn from each other’s experiences. If we insult each other, we both lose. But if we learn from each other, we both profit. You may now guess which of these options

is favored by Armenians.

--------------------

 

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

ON COLLABORATION

******************************

If you read the testimony of French collaborators

(the very same collabos

who were condemned to death after the Liberation),

you will discover that they did whatever it is that they did

in the name of God and Country;

if it weren’t for them,

things would have been worse.

In short, they were heroes

and the nation should be grateful to them.

But the nation was not grateful:

it found them guilty of treason and condemned them to death!

And because we have at no time tried

to de-Ottomanize and de-Stalinize ourselves,

we now swim in a sea of corruption, incompetence,

pseudo-Ottomanism and crypto-Stalinism.

ON CHARLATANS

*************************

An honest man expresses his disagreement honestly.

By contrast, a charlatan does so with passion.

That’s because it is not his views that he defends

but something much more important:

his self-esteem, his prestige and power,

perhaps even his source of income.

Yes, he has every reason to be furious

in the name of God and Country.

Give such a man a friendly regime and a machine gun

and he will gladly terrorize and massacre

to prove his loyalty to the Leader.

Am I talking about Turks and Germans?

No, my friends, I am talking about homo sapiens

and I am saying we don’t belong to a different species.

 

--------------------

 

 

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

YANKEE GO HOME!

*****************************

Criticizing Americans or for that matter Turks I now consider a total waste of time and an exercise in futility. I know what I am saying because after 30 books and 3000 critical commentaries, I have failed to enlighten a single dupe, expose a single charlatan, and reform a single Panchoonie.

To those who say, "That’s because you are a bad writer and a worse critic," I ask: "What has been Odian’s influence on our Panchoonies?"

To be an Armenian these days means to be a constant target of phony reports by Panchoonies whose favorite punch line is "Mi kich pogh oughargetsek" (Send us a little money).

In the words of a fellow writer: "The only time my fellow Armenians remember I exist is when they want my money."

Now I know why some benefactors prefer to remain anonymous and others, after hiring press secretaries or creating committees, use them as shields against rapacious wheeler-dealers and professional bloodsuckers…but even then they are taken in, again and again and again!

--------------------

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

FROM MY NOTEBOOKS

*********************************

You cannot trust the solution of a problem to those who created the problem or to those who profit by the problem. The first will never admit the existence of the problem and the second will never do anything against their own interests.

An eye for an eye is a legal principle that can be enforced only among equals. When a tyrant deals with a dissident or an empire with an unfriendly minority, it’s more like an eyebrow for both eyes, ears, limbs, lungs, liver, heart, and a few other vital organs thrown in for good measure.

 

Tyrants neither explain nor reason. They lie and threaten. Even when they say nothing they lie. Even the blank spaces between their lines and words are menacing. Even their punctuation marks thirst for blood.

 

The world provides us today with many examples of nations and tribes in all stages of development, decline, and degeneration. My guess is, in terms of international prestige, we stand somewhere slightly above the Gypsies and Kurds and below the Turks.

 

Where dissent is silenced, a fraction of the people are also silenced; in the same way that where books are burned, people will also be burned.

 

A fanatic is one who thinks if he screams loud enough no one will notice the total absence of meaning from what he says.

 

An Armenian writer has as much of a future in an Armenian environment as a sardine in a pool of hungry sharks.

 

The more successful the charlatan the more honest the mask.

The greater the power or wealth the more impenetrable the skull.

The deeper the Ottomanization the more strident the patriotism.

 

A partisan defending a fellow partisan is like a wolf defending another wolf to an audience of sheep.

 

After witnessing forty years of steady decline and degeneration I find it extremely difficult to be optimistic. The best I can do is being a pessimist who has lost his faith in miracles, but not quite yet.

 

--------------------

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

THE PHANTOM OF STALIN

**********************************

It was bound to happen sooner or later and, in retrospect, I am surprised it did not happen sooner. It took our partisan editors more than ten years to silence me. It is almost as if an invisible Stalin had picked up the phone and said to them: "Drop the bastard, he is not one of us!"

After being published regularly for more than a dozen years in ARF (Tashnak), and ADL (Ramgavar) weeklies in the United States, Canada, and the Middle East, I suddenly acquired the status of a non-person.

I am not complaining. On the contrary! Think of what would have happened to me in the Ottoman Empire at the turn of the century (I would have been denounced to the Sultan’s secret police) or in the Soviet Union in the 1930s (shot).

This may explain why I am tempted to go down on my knees every morning, noon, and night and thank the Lord (in whose existence I don’t believe) for allowing me to live among people who don’t just brag about being civilized but behave in a civilized manner by respecting my fundamental human right of free speech.

--------------------

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

ON OUR OBSESSION WITH ODAR IDEAS

*********************************************

We love ideas but only if they come from abroad.

We love odar ideas even if they may result in our destruction.

As for our own ideas: we treat them like trash.

Let us consider the three most important ideas that shaped our destiny as a people: Christianity, nationalism, and Marxism.

Christianity reduced us to a giaour island in a Muslim sea.

Nationalism brought on a series of massacres that resulted in the 1915 Genocide.

Marxism in its Stalinist phase systematically exterminated our political and intellectual elites.

And now, consider the idea of solidarity, which may be said to be the central idea of our literature from Yeghishe in the 5th century ("Solidarity is the mother of good deeds, divisiveness of evil ones") to Charents in the 20th ("O Armenian people, your salvation lies only in your collective powers").

To those who say "We don’t need criticism; we need constructive ideas, we need solutions!" I say, it is not the absence of ideas or solutions that prevents us from realizing our potential as a nation but tribal leaders with thick skulls and single-digit IQs who can’t tell the difference between literature and recycled enemy propaganda.

--------------------

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

OF MICE AND MEN

*****************************

There are people out there

-- and I mean highly trained professionals –

whose main job consists in introducing complexities

where none exists.

One could say that they are trained

to take a simple straight line

and to make of it a maze so intricate

that even a mouse of genius

could not extricate himself from it

even if he tried for a thousand years.

Which is where we come in.

We might as well be that mouse

at the mercy of professional charlatans

who have created such a complex

and serpentine maze around us

that we have failed again and again

to emerge from our tribal stage

and establish our place in the sun as a nation.

The enigma of our destiny?

What nonsense!

Understand this and consider the enigma

(which was never there to begin with)

solved.

--------------------

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

THREE SCHOOLS OF THOUGHT

****************************************

The first says,

our problems are so complex that

they have resisted all solutions.

The second says,

our problems are our source of strength,

which is why we shouldn’t even try to solve them.

The third says, problems?

What problems?

We have none.

The world has problems.

We don’t!

And sure enough,

these dime-a-dozen self-appointed pundits

spend most of their time and efforts

providing solutions to the problems of the world,

including the Middle East, the United States, the Caucasus,

and strange as it may seem,

Azerbaijan and Turkey.

--------------------

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

WITH APOLOGIES TO MT. ARARAT

**************************************

Again and again I am accused of having a low opinion of my fellow Armenians. Nonsense! I have a low – make it, very low – opinion of charlatans, brown-nosers and parasites (regardless of nationality). I loathe all lies, half-truths and propaganda.

As for being a proud Armenian: In a world of proud Gypsies, Kurds and Turks, I have no use for pride.

I should like to see a world inhabited by humble men.

I should like to see my fellow Armenians reflect and meditate on our collective failures as opposed to bragging about our individual successes (Mikoyan, Saroyan, Gulbenkian, Mamoulian…), or at least to refrain from using our celebrities to cover up our shortcomings, and if that’s too much to ask, may Mt. Ararat forgive me.

--------------------

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

CONFESSIONS OF A FAILURE

****************************************

Some of my critics may not be aware of the fact that

once upon a time I thought what they think,

I felt what they feel,

and I attacked anyone who dared to voice the views

that I voice today.

The transition from what I was to what I am

was not an easy one, and it didn’t happen suddenly

as a result of a single insight or experience.

Rather, it was a painfully slow process that took many years.

There was a time when I, too,

after a bad experience with a fellow Armenian,

would dismiss it as an anomaly

or ascribe it to conditions and forces beyond our control.

Which is what most of our chauvinists tend to do today,

with the result that things keep going from bad to worse.

Can I, or a thousand writers like me, arrest this downward spiral?

I doubt it.

But then, I speak as a skeptic, a pessimist,

and as my critics are fond of reminding me, a failure.

The questions that need to be asked here are:

Has the dogmatism of our bosses and bishops

solved any one of our problems?

What if optimism in our context

is just another word for wishful thinking or self-deception?

Finally, in what way is my own failure as a writer

different from our failure as a nation?

Or, why is it that my critics

gloat over my failure as a writer

and choose to ignore our failures as a nation?

--------------------

 

ara baliozian

[MJ]

GUNGO-HO ARMENIANS

**********************************

It happens all the time.

Gung-ho Armenians come to me and say:

"Let’s do this, that and the other!

After all, we are Armenians and

we should do whatever we can for our nation,"

or words to that effect.

What happens next?

They are seldom heard from again, alas!

And why?

I have no idea, but I can guess.

After a minor setback,

a harsh exchange of words,

or a silly misunderstanding,

they forget all about their beloved nation

and busy themselves with more important things,

such as making a living,

raising a family,

collecting stamps,

or surfing on the internet.

Not that I blame them.

I don’t mind admitting that

I too am tempted to quit every day.

If I go on,

it’s because I like doing what comes easy.

If tomorrow I find a better-paying job,

I will quit before anyone can say

Jack S. Avanakian.

I reject the mantle of hero

and I have nothing but contempt for readers

who demand martyrdom from me.

I am an ordinary joe

whose sole aim in life is to live in peace

and make himself useful to people

who are civilized enough

not to spit in his face.

I admire the Don

but Sancho Panza is my man.

--------------------

 

ara baliozian

[ara baliozian]

THE REST IS SILENCE

*********************************

We Have all met the Armenian who has been

so thoroughly Ottomanized or Stalinized

that he considers democracy an aberration,

intolerance (which he thinks of as inflexible adherence to noble principles) a virtue,

and human rights an evil concept

invented by the corrupt West

whose ultimate aim is drag the rest of the world down

to its own level of moral decline and degeneration.

Whenever I confront such an Armenian

I cannot help thinking that

these are not his ideas but those of a parish priest

(whose prejudices have been blessed by a bishop)

or a schoolmaster (whose ignorance has been legitimized by a boss…

all in the name of God and Country, of course,

and to hell with reason, common sense and decency).

And I write not because I want to change anyone’s mind

but because I am not old and wise enough to reconcile myself to silence,

and even as I go on writing

I look forward to the day when

I will no longer feel the need to write….

[ara baliozian]

THE O/Z CONTROVERSY

***********************************

How right were Oshagan pere et fils in asserting that Zarian was just another East-Armenian windbag without a single original idea in his head?

Let me begin with a digression. About thirty years ago I remember to have read a book by an American academic named Stern (I forget his first name) in which every single one of Sartre’s ideas was traced back to Plato, Hegel, Marx, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Husserl, Heidegger and a few other lesser-known precursors. The purpose of the book was to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Sartre was a derivative writer. Thirty years later Sartre has lost none of his prestige and professor Stern none of his status as a marginal figure, and marginal to the point of irrelevance.

Poetry, it has been said, happens when two words meet for the first time. One could also say that originality happens when two ideas are brought together for the first time. It follows that, even if Sartre’s and Zarian’s originality consisted in combining ideas, they both deserve a place in world literature and a hundred Sterns and a thousand Oshagans are powerless to alter that fact.

Questions: Why is it that the Oshagans and their students find it necessary to denigrate Zarian? Why is it that this anti-Zarian faction is associated with the ARF (Tashnagtsoutiun)? Is their hostility towards Zarian an expression of their own convictions or is it an extension of their loyalty to the Party?

To be noted: Zarian’s contempt for the Party was well known: "Our political parties have been of no political use to us," he once said. "Their greatest enemy is free speech."

[ara baliozian]

MORE ON THE O/Z CONTROVERSY

*********************************************

Totalitarian regimes silence dissidents not because they are afraid of them (imagine a Stalin or Hitler commanding vast armies and a ruthless secret police being afraid of defenseless scribblers!) but because they are afraid of the truth, and more precisely, because they don’t want to be exposed for what they really are: a criminal gang. And when these regimes collapse it’s not because of what the dissidents wrote or said but because sooner or later reality is bound to assert its inflexible laws, two of them being: you can’t fool even fools all the time, and you can’t intimidate even cowards forever.

Now then, ask yourself this question: Why is it that our political parties find it necessary to denigrate and sometimes even silence some of our writers? -- and I am not talking here about our Communist Party in Soviet Armenia but our own so-called "Democratic" (ADL) and "Revolutionary" (ARF) parties in the diaspora.

[ara baliozian]

ROLE MODELS

*****************************

No one has ever said to me "After reading Odian I realized I was a Panchoonie," or "After reading Baronian I realized I was a damn fool," or "After reading Charents I realized our dividers are our gravediggers."

Speaking for myself: after publishing thirty books and more than three thousand commentaries, I have succeeded in only one endeavor: making enemies who hate me unto death.

What have we learned from our literature?

Nothing!

What have we learned from our former lords and masters?

Everything! -- and above all how to hate.

Which may suggest that, those among us who preach Armenianism prefer to practice Ottomanism.

[ara baliozian]

MEMO

*******************

Nothing I say is original.

When I promote originality,

all I am doing is recycling the biblical dictum

"A house divided against itself cannot stand."

Or rather,

I am reminding those who make a comfortable living

by delivering sermons on self-sacrifice

and speeches on dedication to principles

that the very least they can do

is make an effort to practice

a tiny fraction of what they preach –

if, that is,

they don’t want to be exposed as grave-digging charlatans.

[ara baliozian]

BEFORE & AFTER

*******************************

Before I translated Zarian, I was a solitary creature living in the middle of nowhere. After I published my Zarian translations, every other Armenian writer became my close friend. But their friendship came to an abrupt, and sometimes even rude, end when they realized I had no intention of translating them. Now I know how women feel when they are pursued not for their minds but for their interstices.

[ara baliozian]

OF SYMBOLS & MYTHS

***********************************

While watching a TV documentary on Armenians in America, I have trouble identifying myself with old-timers speaking about the massacres and young ones speaking about lokhma. Which raises the question: What are the symbols and myths that identify us as a nation?

The tricolor? (Until recently it tribalized and divided us, which is not what symbols are meant to do).

Vartan Mamikoan? (He was probably a Chinaman).

The Battle of Avarair? (Historians have questioned its authenticity).

Mt. Ararat? (It belongs to the Turks, and the Kurds say it’s theirs).

The massacres? (They only certify our status as triple victims: of Turkish savagery, Western double-talk, and the incompetence of our own leadership).

No wonder most Armenians feel more secure when they shed their Armenianism, change their names, and acquire an odar identity (Henri Troyat, Arthur Adamov, Nina Berberova) as our poets lament and complain and say, we are few, we are few, we are few…in an effort to cover up the fact that our sense of solidarity (or nationhood) is weak, our mortality (or massacre) rate high, and our alienation and assimilation rate even higher.