Friday

[ara baliozian]

Friday, August 29, 2003

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Everyone has his way of judging people and nations.

I judge them by the manner in which they treat writers.

History provides us with many precedents,

the most recent being Talaat’s Turkey and Stalin’s USSR.

And then there are the faceless flunkies

of our bosses, bishops and benefactors

who operate anonymously behind closed doors.

*

In the eyes of many Armenians,

especially those in authority,

the status of an Armenian writer is no better

than that of white trash.

To those who say what’s wrong with the way in which

writers like Oshagan, Shant and Garabents were treated?

I say, wrong question. None of these writers

qualifies as a dissident.

Whenever they discussed our problems

they tended to ascribe them to the people

rather than its leadership on whose goodwill

they were dependent.

Consider instead the treatment accorded

to Zarian, Shahnour and Massikian.

And consider the fate of many young writers

who gave up at an early stage of their career

because they saw the writing on the wall.

Result: Armenian literature has been reduced to a cemetery.

*

Why is it that dogs that kill

are invariably described by their owners as "friendly?"

and serial killers are described

as "nice" by their neighbors?

*

Being an Armenian writer

amounts to being a shoemaker in a country

where everyone prefers to go barefoot.

*

In a land of bloodsuckers,

gravediggers will prosper.

*

Armenian saying

(as quoted by Saroyan’s wife in her memoirs):

"If I tell you la, you should understand lalablue."

*

If you rely too much on your authority, money, or charm,

prepare yourself to confront someone

who will defy all three.

As the Greeks knew:

hubris is an open invitation to nemesis.

*

If you decide to adopt a fighting stance,

be prepared to lose some battles.

Which is better than the alternative:

defeat, degradation, despair and death.

*

Italian saying: "Fratelli, flagelli."

(Free translation: "The wrath of brothers,

the wrath of whips.")

*

Gerald Durrell’s memoir MY FAMILY

AND OTHER ANIMALS (1956) contains

an unforgettable and hilarious portrait of

Gostan Zarian.

Gerald Durrell: not to be confused

with his better-known brother Lawrence

(THE ALEXANDRIA QUARTET)

who also wrote extensively about Zarian.

*

Though she discusses many celebrities in her memoirs,

Saroyan’s wife (Carol Matthau) doesn’t even mention Marlon Brando

who knew both her and her daughter intimately.

Neither does she mention Saroyan’s autobiographical novels

in which she plays a prominent but not always a positive role.

*

On the 40th anniversary of Martin Luther’s King famous

"I have a dream" speech in Washington,

I imagine myself in Yerevan facing a large crowd of Armenians:

What would I say?

What else but "I have a nightmare!"

*

I don’t agree with a reality that makes crooks wealthy

and honest men poor, and because I speak

of this reality, some of my readers hate me

as if I were responsible for everything that has gone wrong

in their lives.

*

If some people have no interest in knowing themselves

it may be because they already know enough to know

that they are not worth knowing.

*

After reading the biographies and memoirs of celebrities

I have reached the conclusion that

some failures are happier than some successes.

Fame and fortune appear as necessary conditions of happiness

only in the eyes of those who have neither.

*

Among Armenians it is not always clear

who is trying to educate whom.

*

None of us can claim to know and understand everything.

But since we are all products of a unique set

of conditions and experiences,

we may know something the other doesn’t.

You may have noticed by now that

when Armenians get together

their number one priority is not to learn from one another

but to insult and, whenever they can, to silence anyone

who dares to disagree with them.

This is not conducive to solidarity and progress

but to disintegration and darkness.

Hence the old adage: "Mart bidi chellank!"

or: we shall never acquire the status of human beings.

And why?

Perhaps because we are more interest in politics and power

than in literature and truth.

And we are more interested in power

because we were deprived of it during most of our history.

The question is:

can we acquire power by violating

one another’s human right of free speech?

Can we acquire strength by dividing ourselves?

Can we improve our condition in any way

by hurling insults at one another?