An Interview with Arundhati Roy
By Khatchig Mouradian
The Armenian Weekly
Feb. 9, 2008
Arundhati Roy was born in 1959 in Shillong, India. She studied architecture in New Delhi, where she now lives, and has worked as a film designer, actor, and screenplay writer in India. Roy is the author of the novel The God of Small Things, (Random House/HarperPerennial) for which she received the 1997 Booker Prize. The novel has been translated into dozens of languages worldwide. She has written several non-fiction books: The Cost of Living (Random House/Modern Library), Power Politics (South End Press), War Talk (South End Press), An Ordinary Person’s Guide to Empire (South End Press) and Public Power in the Age of Empire (Seven Stories/Open Media).
Roy was featured in the BBC television documentary, “Dam/age,” which chronicles her work in support of the struggle against big dams in India and the contempt of court case that led to a prolonged legal case against her and eventually a one-day jail sentence in spring 2002. A collection of interviews with Arundhati Roy by David Barsamian was published as The Checkbook and the Cruise Missile (South End Press). Roy is the recipient of the 2002 Lannan Foundation Cultural Freedom Prize.
On Jan. 18, 2008, Roy delivered the Hrant Dink memorial lecture at Bosphorus University in Istanbul. In her lecture, titled “Listening to Grasshoppers: Genocide, Denial and Celebration,” Roy reflected on the legacy of Hrant Dink and dealt with the history of the “genocidal impulse,” the Armenian genocide of 1915 and the killing of Muslims in Gujarat, India in 2002.
Speaking about the slain editor of the Turkish-Armenian newspaper Agos, Roy said, “I never met Hrant Dink, a misfortune that will be mine for time to come. From what I know of him, of what he wrote, what he said and did, how he lived his life, I know that had I been here in Istanbul a year ago I would have been among the one hundred thousand people who walked with his coffin in dead silence through the wintry streets of this city, with banners saying, ‘We are all Armenians,’ ‘We are all Hrant Dink.’ Perhaps I’d have carried the one that said, ‘One and a half million plus one.’”
“I wonder what thoughts would have gone through my head as I walked beside his coffin,” she added. “Maybe I would have heard a reprise of the voice of Araxie Barsamian, mother of my friend David Barsamian, telling the story of what happened to her and her family. She was ten years old in 1915. She remembered the swarms of grasshoppers that arrived in her village, Dubne, which was north of the historic city Dikranagert, now Diyarbakir. The village elders were alarmed, she said, because they knew in their bones that the grasshoppers were a bad omen. They were right; the end came in a few months, when the wheat in the fields was ready for harvesting.”
In this interview, conducted by phone on Feb. 2, we talk about some of the issues she raised in her lecture and reflect on genocide and resistance.
Khatchig Mouradian—What was going through your head when you were writing the speech for the commemoration in Istanbul of Hrant Dink’s assassination?
Arundhati Roy—These days, we are going through a kind of psychotic convulsion in India. Genocide and its celebration are in the air. And it’s terrifying for me to watch people celebrating genocide every day. It was at a time when I was very struck by this celebration in India and the denial in Turkey that they asked me to go to Istanbul.
When I landed in Istanbul, I realized that there’s a very big difference between what Armenians, Turks and others could say outside Turkey—where everybody could be very direct about the Armenian genocide—and inside Turkey—where, Hrant Dink, for example, was trying to find a way of saying things in order to continue living. His idea was to speak out, but not to die.
In Istanbul, I spoke with people and I was very concerned not to give the impression that I flew in, made a speech, and flew out leaving everybody else in trouble. I was interested in helping to create an atmosphere where people could begin to talk about the Armenian genocide to each other. After all, that’s the project of the Armenians who are living in Turkey and trying to survive there.
At the same time, I was somebody who is involved quite deeply in issues in India and I didn’t want to be some global intellectual who flies in, makes some superficial statements and then flies out. I wanted to relate the issue to what I knew and what I fought for, and tried to push a little bit more and a little bit more. And this is not a simple thing to do.
K.M.—The story that weaves your lecture together is that of your friend, David Barsamian’s mother, Araxie Barsamian. In an interview, you say, “I think that a story is like the surface of water, and you can take whatever you want from it.” What did you take from the story of Araxie Barsamian?
A.R.—In fact, David happened to be in India just before I went to Turkey and we talked about the issue. It mattered to me that I knew him. I’m not saying that if I didn’t know him I wouldn’t have spoken, but it suddenly became something that was more personal. I was having the discussion with a friend that there are people who talk about politics that is informative and politics that is transformative. These are such silly separations because in Turkey, for example, everybody knows what happened. It’s just that there’s a silence around it and you’re not allowed to say what happened. And when you say it, it becomes transformative in itself. I made my point through the words of David’s mother instead of going and saying, “Look, that bullet that was meant to silence Hrant Dink actually made someone like myself take the trouble to go and read history. Whether I say it or I don’t say it, you and I know what happened, and if you want to maintain the silence, then people here will have to fight with that, as I will have to fight with the celebration around genocide in India.”
This is something that a novel writer does. How you say what you want to say is as important as what you want to say. By telling Araxie Barsamian’s story, the history comes alive. You could say that 1.5 million people were killed or you could say that the grasshoppers arrived in Araxie Barsamian’s village…
K.M.—You spoke about the difference between speaking about the Armenian genocide outside and inside Turkey. But in your speech, you are quite bold: You do not come off as trying to imply things rather than stating them outright. You are not trying to avoid using the term genocide…
A.R.—When I started speaking about the term “genocide,” defining it, then talking about the history of genocide and what’s happening in India today—how Indian fascists killed Muslim—I wanted to make it clear that that the genocidal impulse has cut across religions and that the same ugly, fascist rhetoric that the Turks used against the Armenians has been used by the Christians against the Indians, has been used by the Nazis against the Jews, and today, it is being used by Hindus against Muslims. Genocide is such a complex process. The genocidal impulse has never been related to just one culture or just one religion. I spoke about the Armenian genocide and its denial openly to the extent that I could without shutting down the audience.
I would like to note that in my readings, one problem I realized is that many scholars who have studied the Armenian genocide in detail—almost all of them—keep on insisting that it was the first genocide of the 20th century and, in asserting that, they deny the other genocides that took place—for example, the genocide against the Herrero people in 1904. So I was also trying to talk about the Armenian genocide without giving the impression that some victims are more worthy than others.
K.M.—How was your lecture received?
A.R.—The important thing was that it was received. It wasn’t blocked out. It wasn’t denied. People didn’t say, “Oh, here’s a person who has come here to tell us about our own past.” That’s because I wasn’t just talking about the past of Turkey. For me, that was the way of guaranteeing that my talk was received.
The biggest thing is that it was received. It was taken in and it was thought about. I saw many people in tears in the hall. And I hope that in some tiny, little way, it will change the way this subject is spoken of. I might be presuming too much…
K.M.—As you point out in your lecture, genocide and gross human rights violations have plagued us for centuries and they continue to do so. What has changed?
A.R.—I don’t think that there’s been that much change in the genocidal impulse. Technology and industrialization have only enabled human beings to kill each other in larger numbers. I talked about the slaughter of 2,000 Muslims in the state of Gujarat in India. It was all on TV.
About three months ago, the killers were caught on camera talking about how they decided how to target the Muslim community, how it was all planned, how the police was involved, how the chief ministers were involved, how they murdered, how they raped. It was actually broadcast on TV and it worked in the favor of that party. The people who voted for them said, “This is what they deserve.” So I actually feel that this notion of the liberal conscience, of human conscience, is a fake notion. Today in India we are on the verge of something terrible. Like I say in the article, the grasshoppers have landed, and there is a kind of shutting down and cutting off of the poor from their resources, herding them off their land and rivers. And people are just watching. Their eyes are open but they are looking the other way. And again and again we think of the fact that in Germany when Jews were being exterminated, people must have been taking their children to piano lessons, violin lessons, worrying about their children’s homework. That kind of absolute lack of conscience is still present today. No amount of appeal to conscience can make any change. The only way disaster can be averted is if the people who are on the receiving end of that can resist.
Khatchig Mouradian is a journalist, writer and translator, currently based in Boston. He is the editor of the Armenian Weekly. He can be contacted at: khatchigm@hotmail.com.
Showing posts with label Literature. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Literature. Show all posts
Saturday, February 9, 2008
Sunday, December 23, 2007
Une interview de Chris Bohjalian
Le romancier acclamé par la critique parle de sa vie et de son œuvre
Par Khatchig Mouradian
Traduction Louise Kiffer
Chris Bohjalian, acclamé par la critique, est l'auteur de 11 romans, dont plusieurs sont devenus des bestsellers du New York Times. Ses romans s'intitulent "Midwives" (Sage-femmes) - une sélection de Publishers Weekly Best Book, et une sélection de Oprah Book Club: "Before you know Kindness"Et "The Double Bind". Ses ouvrages ont été traduits en 20 langues. Bohjalian est diplômé du Armherst College, et habite à Vermont, avec son épouse et sa fille.Les articles de Bohjalian sont parus dans Cosmopolitan, Reader's Digest et "The Boston Globe Sunday Magazine"Il est journaliste pour Gannett's Burlington Free Press depuis 1992.
Dans cette interview, menée au début du mois, Bohjalian parle de ses romans et de ses articles, ainsi que de ses passions et de ses souvenirs.
* * *
Khatchig Mouradian – Vous avez déménagé au Vermont, de New York après une épreuve désagréable avec un taxi. En quoi Chris Bohjalian, romancier de New York serait-il différent du romancier de Vermont en termes d'inspiration et de problèmes que vous soulevez dans vos romans ?
Chris Bohjalian – Les romanciers parlent d'un certain nombre de sujets angoissants sur la façon dont ils ont trouvé leur voix. La réalité, cependant, est que j'ai trouvé la mienne dans le Vermont. Le Vermont est un microcosme fascinant pour des questions qui relèvent de partout – l'environnement contre le développement, la médecine alternative et la traditionnelle, tout le bagage que nous amenons sur l'orientation sexuelle, et c'est si petit qu'il est possible d'animer ces problèmes à une échelle humaine, reconnaissable et profondément accessible. Par exemple, je n'aurais jamais écrit un livre sur le lieu de naissance littéral et métaphorique dans notre culture (Midwives), si j'étais resté à Manhattan. Après tout, la maison natale ne fait pas partie du dialogue. Je n'aurais pas non plus écrit un roman vaguement écologique comme Water Witches – et il est intéressant de remarquer que j'ai écrit ce roman en 1993 (il a été publié en 1995) des années avant que nous soyons préoccupés par le changement du climat mondial tel que nous le sommes maintenant. Ce n'est pas que je sois particulièrement prescient, mais en quelque sorte le Vermont l'est.
Même un roman tel que "The Double Bind" qui explore des thèmes que je n'aurais probablement pas abordés à New York – y compris naturellement la maladie mentale, et les sans abris – a trouvé son information dans le Vermont. Il était facile de faire des recherches sur le sujet à l'hôpital psychiatrique d'Etat, et dans l'un des établissements correctionnels, de même que pour trouver des thérapeutes et des assistants sociaux capables de m'aider, puisque nous sommes si peu nombreux. Un appel téléphonique ça et là, et je pouvais obtenir les interviews nécessaires.
Pourtant, j'aime New York. J'y retourne souvent, et la moitié de "Before you Know Kindness" s'est fait là-bas. Mais je pense que j'ai trouvé au Vermont des sujets plus aptes à renforcer mon style.
K.M. – Comment avez-vous décidé des sujets à traiter dans vos romans ? Dites voir comment vous procédez quand vous écrivez un roman.
C.B. L'inspiration provient invariablement de ma vie personnelle. Quelqu'un que j'ai rencontré, ou quelque chose dont j'ai entendu parler, ou que j'ai vu.
"The Double Bind" peut en être un bon exemple. Le roman a pris naissance en décembre 2003, quand Rita Markley, la directrice administrative du logement des sans abris, a partagé avec moi un box de vieilles photos. Les images en noir et blanc avaient été prises par un photographe qui avait été sans abri et qui était mort dans l'appartement de l'immeuble que son organisation avait trouvé pour lui. Il s'appelait Bob "Soupy" Campbell.
Les photos étaient remarquables, à la fois grâce au talent manifeste de Campbell, et à cause du sujet. J'ai reconnu les artistes – musiciens, comédiens, acteurs – et les rédacteurs sur la plupart d'entre elles.
J'écris un article hebdomadaire pour le "Burlington free Press" qui explique pourquoi Rita voulait que je voie les photos. Elle pensait que cela pourrait faire une histoire intéressante et elle avait tout à fait raison. J'ai écrit à propos de Campbell en décembre 2003, faisant des recherches sur sa vie et ses réalisations, et les raisons pour lesquelles il s'était retrouvé sans abri, et à ce jour, c'est resté les textes favoris que j'ai écrits pour ce journal. J'avais rendu célèbres les talents de Campbell (qui étaient nombreux) et j'avais rappelé aux lecteurs la ligne très fine qui sépare tant de nous de ceux qui deviennent sans abris. Mais ensuite, j'ai jugé que j'avais épuisé le sujet.
Six mois plus tard, en juin 2004, j'ai relu "The Great Gatsby" (Gatsby le Magnifique). J'adore ce roman. Peu d'écrivains ont ciselé des phrases si constamment lumineuses que Fitzerald ou compris la classe et la culture, et le profond désir également.
Ensuite, j'ai été faire une promenade en vélo sur une vilaine route profonde sous une canopée dans les bois. Ma femme avait entendu une histoire à la radio ce jour-là, que des parents avaient dit ceci à leurs enfants: si quelqu'un essayait de les enlever alors qu'ils étaient en train de rouler sur leur vélo, ils devraient se cramponner à leur guidon de toutes leurs forces. Il est plus difficile d'enlever quelqu'un et de le jeter à l'arrière d'une voiture ou d'une camionnette, s'il est fermement attaché à son vélo. La géométrie ne fonctionne pas.
Comme je roulais, je me suis mis à penser à Bob Campbell pour la première fois depuis des mois, et je pensais à lui relativement à Gatsby le magnifique. Pourquoi ? Peut-être parce que nous voyons toujours Gatsby le magnifique à travers la brume des photos en noir et blanc – le medium de Campbell. Et, naturellement, Gatsby le Magnifique est un roman de l'époque du jazz – or Campbell avait photographié de nombreux musiciens de jazz.
Et ainsi l'idée du "Double Bind" (double lien) s'est formée dans mon esprit, sur cette vilaine route. Je savais précisément comment un livre allait commencer, et pour la première fois de ma vie - je savais précisément comment il allait finir.
Bien sûr, cela voulait dire que je connaissais le A et le Z, mais pas les 24 lettres entre les deux. Cela voulait dire que j'avais une série de problèmes différents à résoudre. J'écrivis quatre brouillons avant même de pouvoir commencer à en publier un sérieusement. Un projet Henry-James-ian à la troisième personne; puis un projet à la première personne raconté par Laurel Estabrook (le personnage principal); ensuite un projet avec plusieurs narrateurs à la première personne; et finalement un projet subjectif à la troisième personne – moins froid et omniscient que la version initiale. Le brouillon a marché dans des chemins que le premier n'avait pas pris. C'est seulement là que j'ai commencé à perfectionner et à resserrer le roman.
K.M. – Les femmes figurent éminemment dans plusieurs de vos romans. Parlez-nous du défi d'écrire un roman comme "Sage-Femme" ou "The Double Bind " où fouiller dans le psychisme des comportements est la clé.
C.B. –J'aurais souhaité avoir eu un procédé spécifique mais je ne trouve pas qu'écrire sur les femmes soit si différent qu'écrire sur les hommes. Dans chacun des cas, c'est un acte d'imagination. Comment une personne va-t-elle réagir à un événement ou à un moment spécifique ? Qu'est-ce qu'un individu va éprouver ou penser ? Qu'est-ce que les gens voient ou entendent ?
Au cours des dix dernières années, j'ai écrit des romans ou décrit des scènes dans des romans en partant du point de vue (entre autres) d'une sage-femme, d'une lesbienne transsexuelle, d'une vigoureuse citoyenne âgée, d'un enfant américano-africain placé dans une famille d'accueil, une fillette de dix ans, une aristocrate prussienne de 18 ans en 1945, un jeune homme juif d'Allemagne qui avait sauté d'un train à destination d'un camp de la mort en 1943, et une variété d'hommes d'âge moyen à demi chauves. J'ai vraiment trouvé cette dernière catégorie – les hommes d'âge moyen à demi chauves comme moi, la moins intéressante.
K.M. – Parlez-nous de votre prochain roman Skeletons at the Feast (Squelettes à la fête)
C.B.- Ce roman est un départ – et c'est, au point de vue création – la chose la plus satisfaisante que j'ai faite dans ma vie (cela ne veut pas dire que c'est plutôt bien, ou que j'ai fait quelque chose de juste – c'est seulement que cela a été un combat et que c'était réconfortant).
En 1999, le père d'une petite fille de la classe du jardin d'enfant de ma fille m'a demandé si je voulais lire le journal inédit que sa grand'mère lui avait laissé. Sa mère venait de le traduire de l'allemand en anglais, et l'avait tapé à la machine. Nous étions de bons amis, je fus donc heureux d'y jeter un coup d'œil.
Le journal racontait en détails la vie de cette femme dans une propriété massive et une ferme dans la Prusse orientale, et il y avait un tas de choses qui me fascinaient – principalement les déplacements désespérés des femmes au cours des derniers mois de la seconde guerre mondiale pour atteindre les lignes britanniques et américaines avant l'arrivée de l'armée soviétique. Je l'ai proposé à plusieurs éditeurs, mais aucun n'était preneur.
Des années plus tard, en 2005, j'ai lu "Armageddon" de Max Hastings son compte-rendu non romanesque de la dernière année de la Seconde Guerre Mondiale en Allemagne, et je suis tombé sur des références à des scènes qui m'étaient familières. Puis je me suis rendu compte que j'avais lu ces mêmes faits dans ce journal six ans auparavant. J'ai demandé à mon ami si je pouvais le relire. Quand je l'ai revu, j'ai décidé que je voulais écrire un roman situé dans cette période, et c'est ainsi que j'ai commencé une partie de la recherche la plus intense (et l'écriture) de ma carrière professionnelle.
Skeletons at the Feast est un roman d'amour, un triangle d'amour, en fait qui se passe en Pologne et en Allemagne dans les six derniers mois de la Seconde Guerre Mondiale.
Les personnages ? Il y a Anna Emmerich, 18 ans, une fille d'aristocrates prussiens qui étaient à l'origine satisfaits quand leur propriété massive redevint allemande en 1939, mais qui découvrirent au cours des cinq années suivantes ce que signifiait réellement pour la gestion nazie leur district rural.
Il y a son amoureux, Callum Finella, un prisonnier de guerre de 20 ans, qui a été détaché du stalag dans sa ferme familiale comme travailleur forcé. Et il y a un caporal de la Wehrmacht de 26 ans, que les deux autres connaissent sous le nom de Manfred – mais qui est en réalité un chanteur, un Juif allemand qui s'est débrouillé pour oser s'échapper d'un train à destination d'Auschwitz, et qui a depuis lors saboté l'effort de guerre nazi.
Le roman raconte la plus longue journée de leur vie. Leur essai de croiser les rescapés du troisième Reich, de Varsovie au Rhin s'il le faut, pour atteindre les lignes britanniques et américaines.
K.M.- Nous avons discuté du rôle que le Vermont a joué dans votre œuvre. Qu'en est-il du rôle que vos parents et votre famille élargie ont joué, et de celui que votre épouse et votre fille jouent maintenant ? Comment diffusent-elles votre œuvre ?
C.B.- Ma mère s'est éteinte en 1995. Et mes parents – mon père naturellement depuis 1995 – vivent à des milliers de kilomètres depuis 1988. Il est certain que mon père est fier de moi. Ma mère l'était jusqu'à sa mort. Mais je ne dirais pas qu'ils ont influencé ma décision de devenir écrivain. Ils aimaient et soutenaient, et lisaient tout ce qu'un enfant pouvait désirer de ses parents. Mais ils ne furent pas un facteur conscient de ce que je faisais ou des sujets que je choisissais pour mes romans.
Ma femme et ma fille, en revanche, on joué un rôle critique dans mon travail. Ma femme est une éditrice merveilleuse et patiente. Elle, et Shaye Areheart (mon éditeur à Random House) sont les deux premiers lecteurs de tout ce que j'écris. J'apprécie énormément le jugement de ma femme.
Et le fait d'être parent a considérablement changé ce que j'écris. Voyez les romans tels que "les Sages-Femmes" et "Before you know Kindness", et le "Buffalo Soldier". Etre parent a été très important pour eux. Ils n'existeraient pas si ne n'avais pas eu la chance d'avoir ma fille. Et la petite fille dans "The Law of Similars" ? Mais, c'est ma petite fille quand elle avait trois ou quatre ans.
K.M.- Parlez-nous de vos souvenirs de jeunesse qui vous plaisent le plus..
C.B. J'ai eu une enfance classique de banlieue des années 60-70. J'ai grandi dans différentes banlieues à problèmes juste à l'extérieur de New York City (avec un détour de trois ans à Miami, Fla). Quand j'ai lu "Le Chien noir du Destin" de Peter Balakian, j'ai perçu les échos de ma propre enfance.
Nous avons aussi beaucoup déménagé, cependant, et à une certaine période, j'ai été dans quatre écoles différentes en quatre ans. Et ainsi, bien que mon enfance ne fût pas mauvaise, elle ne rassembla pas autour de moi beaucoup d'amis une fois que j'eus terminé ma 6ème année. Le fait est que mes amis ont changé par nécessité presque chaque année, depuis la 7ème année.
Mes souvenirs favoris, dans le désordre, sont:
Jouer au baseball dans la Little League de Stamford, Conn.;
Lire pour la première fois Johnny Tremain et " To Kill a Mocking Bird" et "April Morning".
Rendre visite à mes grands-parents à Tuckhahoe, N.Y. et écouter Léo Bohjalian – mon grand-père jouer du oud, après avoir perdu sa femme dans une piscine. Je peux encore sentir les beureks de ma grand'mère.
Organiser des cartes de baseball dans mon salon avant les orages;
Voler partout dans des aéroplanes
Etre follement effrayé par les films suivants: "The Birds (Les oiseaux) "The Haunting" et "Psycho".
K.M. – Vous avez écrit des articles pour Burlington Free Press depuis environ 17 ans maintenant. Parlez-nous de cette expérience.
C.B. J'aime bien écrire des articles, sinon je ne le ferais pas. J'écris habituellement à la fin de la semaine, et c'est un charmant répit de mon roman, qui peut être parfois sombre. Cela ne veut pas dire que je n'aborde pas des sujets graves dans mes colonnes à l'occasion. Je le fais. J'ai écrit par exemple, sur la mort de ma mère, sur le changement du climat dans le monde, et sur la guerre en Irak. Mais généralement, c'est une occasion d'explorer quelque chose de personnel, ou quelque chose qui me fait sourire.
Et alors que les gens me disent que ça doit être stressant de rédiger un article chaque semaine, ça ne l'est pas vraiment. C'est beaucoup moins stressant qu'un roman. Le secret ? J'essaie de ne jamais perdre de vue le fait que quelques heures après la parution de l'article le dimanche matin, il aide soit à allumer le feu dans le poêle à bois soit à être étalé sous la litière du chat.
http://www.armenweb.org/espaces/louise/reportages/chris-bohjalian.html
Par Khatchig Mouradian
Traduction Louise Kiffer
Chris Bohjalian, acclamé par la critique, est l'auteur de 11 romans, dont plusieurs sont devenus des bestsellers du New York Times. Ses romans s'intitulent "Midwives" (Sage-femmes) - une sélection de Publishers Weekly Best Book, et une sélection de Oprah Book Club: "Before you know Kindness"Et "The Double Bind". Ses ouvrages ont été traduits en 20 langues. Bohjalian est diplômé du Armherst College, et habite à Vermont, avec son épouse et sa fille.Les articles de Bohjalian sont parus dans Cosmopolitan, Reader's Digest et "The Boston Globe Sunday Magazine"Il est journaliste pour Gannett's Burlington Free Press depuis 1992.
Dans cette interview, menée au début du mois, Bohjalian parle de ses romans et de ses articles, ainsi que de ses passions et de ses souvenirs.
* * *
Khatchig Mouradian – Vous avez déménagé au Vermont, de New York après une épreuve désagréable avec un taxi. En quoi Chris Bohjalian, romancier de New York serait-il différent du romancier de Vermont en termes d'inspiration et de problèmes que vous soulevez dans vos romans ?
Chris Bohjalian – Les romanciers parlent d'un certain nombre de sujets angoissants sur la façon dont ils ont trouvé leur voix. La réalité, cependant, est que j'ai trouvé la mienne dans le Vermont. Le Vermont est un microcosme fascinant pour des questions qui relèvent de partout – l'environnement contre le développement, la médecine alternative et la traditionnelle, tout le bagage que nous amenons sur l'orientation sexuelle, et c'est si petit qu'il est possible d'animer ces problèmes à une échelle humaine, reconnaissable et profondément accessible. Par exemple, je n'aurais jamais écrit un livre sur le lieu de naissance littéral et métaphorique dans notre culture (Midwives), si j'étais resté à Manhattan. Après tout, la maison natale ne fait pas partie du dialogue. Je n'aurais pas non plus écrit un roman vaguement écologique comme Water Witches – et il est intéressant de remarquer que j'ai écrit ce roman en 1993 (il a été publié en 1995) des années avant que nous soyons préoccupés par le changement du climat mondial tel que nous le sommes maintenant. Ce n'est pas que je sois particulièrement prescient, mais en quelque sorte le Vermont l'est.
Même un roman tel que "The Double Bind" qui explore des thèmes que je n'aurais probablement pas abordés à New York – y compris naturellement la maladie mentale, et les sans abris – a trouvé son information dans le Vermont. Il était facile de faire des recherches sur le sujet à l'hôpital psychiatrique d'Etat, et dans l'un des établissements correctionnels, de même que pour trouver des thérapeutes et des assistants sociaux capables de m'aider, puisque nous sommes si peu nombreux. Un appel téléphonique ça et là, et je pouvais obtenir les interviews nécessaires.
Pourtant, j'aime New York. J'y retourne souvent, et la moitié de "Before you Know Kindness" s'est fait là-bas. Mais je pense que j'ai trouvé au Vermont des sujets plus aptes à renforcer mon style.
K.M. – Comment avez-vous décidé des sujets à traiter dans vos romans ? Dites voir comment vous procédez quand vous écrivez un roman.
C.B. L'inspiration provient invariablement de ma vie personnelle. Quelqu'un que j'ai rencontré, ou quelque chose dont j'ai entendu parler, ou que j'ai vu.
"The Double Bind" peut en être un bon exemple. Le roman a pris naissance en décembre 2003, quand Rita Markley, la directrice administrative du logement des sans abris, a partagé avec moi un box de vieilles photos. Les images en noir et blanc avaient été prises par un photographe qui avait été sans abri et qui était mort dans l'appartement de l'immeuble que son organisation avait trouvé pour lui. Il s'appelait Bob "Soupy" Campbell.
Les photos étaient remarquables, à la fois grâce au talent manifeste de Campbell, et à cause du sujet. J'ai reconnu les artistes – musiciens, comédiens, acteurs – et les rédacteurs sur la plupart d'entre elles.
J'écris un article hebdomadaire pour le "Burlington free Press" qui explique pourquoi Rita voulait que je voie les photos. Elle pensait que cela pourrait faire une histoire intéressante et elle avait tout à fait raison. J'ai écrit à propos de Campbell en décembre 2003, faisant des recherches sur sa vie et ses réalisations, et les raisons pour lesquelles il s'était retrouvé sans abri, et à ce jour, c'est resté les textes favoris que j'ai écrits pour ce journal. J'avais rendu célèbres les talents de Campbell (qui étaient nombreux) et j'avais rappelé aux lecteurs la ligne très fine qui sépare tant de nous de ceux qui deviennent sans abris. Mais ensuite, j'ai jugé que j'avais épuisé le sujet.
Six mois plus tard, en juin 2004, j'ai relu "The Great Gatsby" (Gatsby le Magnifique). J'adore ce roman. Peu d'écrivains ont ciselé des phrases si constamment lumineuses que Fitzerald ou compris la classe et la culture, et le profond désir également.
Ensuite, j'ai été faire une promenade en vélo sur une vilaine route profonde sous une canopée dans les bois. Ma femme avait entendu une histoire à la radio ce jour-là, que des parents avaient dit ceci à leurs enfants: si quelqu'un essayait de les enlever alors qu'ils étaient en train de rouler sur leur vélo, ils devraient se cramponner à leur guidon de toutes leurs forces. Il est plus difficile d'enlever quelqu'un et de le jeter à l'arrière d'une voiture ou d'une camionnette, s'il est fermement attaché à son vélo. La géométrie ne fonctionne pas.
Comme je roulais, je me suis mis à penser à Bob Campbell pour la première fois depuis des mois, et je pensais à lui relativement à Gatsby le magnifique. Pourquoi ? Peut-être parce que nous voyons toujours Gatsby le magnifique à travers la brume des photos en noir et blanc – le medium de Campbell. Et, naturellement, Gatsby le Magnifique est un roman de l'époque du jazz – or Campbell avait photographié de nombreux musiciens de jazz.
Et ainsi l'idée du "Double Bind" (double lien) s'est formée dans mon esprit, sur cette vilaine route. Je savais précisément comment un livre allait commencer, et pour la première fois de ma vie - je savais précisément comment il allait finir.
Bien sûr, cela voulait dire que je connaissais le A et le Z, mais pas les 24 lettres entre les deux. Cela voulait dire que j'avais une série de problèmes différents à résoudre. J'écrivis quatre brouillons avant même de pouvoir commencer à en publier un sérieusement. Un projet Henry-James-ian à la troisième personne; puis un projet à la première personne raconté par Laurel Estabrook (le personnage principal); ensuite un projet avec plusieurs narrateurs à la première personne; et finalement un projet subjectif à la troisième personne – moins froid et omniscient que la version initiale. Le brouillon a marché dans des chemins que le premier n'avait pas pris. C'est seulement là que j'ai commencé à perfectionner et à resserrer le roman.
K.M. – Les femmes figurent éminemment dans plusieurs de vos romans. Parlez-nous du défi d'écrire un roman comme "Sage-Femme" ou "The Double Bind " où fouiller dans le psychisme des comportements est la clé.
C.B. –J'aurais souhaité avoir eu un procédé spécifique mais je ne trouve pas qu'écrire sur les femmes soit si différent qu'écrire sur les hommes. Dans chacun des cas, c'est un acte d'imagination. Comment une personne va-t-elle réagir à un événement ou à un moment spécifique ? Qu'est-ce qu'un individu va éprouver ou penser ? Qu'est-ce que les gens voient ou entendent ?
Au cours des dix dernières années, j'ai écrit des romans ou décrit des scènes dans des romans en partant du point de vue (entre autres) d'une sage-femme, d'une lesbienne transsexuelle, d'une vigoureuse citoyenne âgée, d'un enfant américano-africain placé dans une famille d'accueil, une fillette de dix ans, une aristocrate prussienne de 18 ans en 1945, un jeune homme juif d'Allemagne qui avait sauté d'un train à destination d'un camp de la mort en 1943, et une variété d'hommes d'âge moyen à demi chauves. J'ai vraiment trouvé cette dernière catégorie – les hommes d'âge moyen à demi chauves comme moi, la moins intéressante.
K.M. – Parlez-nous de votre prochain roman Skeletons at the Feast (Squelettes à la fête)
C.B.- Ce roman est un départ – et c'est, au point de vue création – la chose la plus satisfaisante que j'ai faite dans ma vie (cela ne veut pas dire que c'est plutôt bien, ou que j'ai fait quelque chose de juste – c'est seulement que cela a été un combat et que c'était réconfortant).
En 1999, le père d'une petite fille de la classe du jardin d'enfant de ma fille m'a demandé si je voulais lire le journal inédit que sa grand'mère lui avait laissé. Sa mère venait de le traduire de l'allemand en anglais, et l'avait tapé à la machine. Nous étions de bons amis, je fus donc heureux d'y jeter un coup d'œil.
Le journal racontait en détails la vie de cette femme dans une propriété massive et une ferme dans la Prusse orientale, et il y avait un tas de choses qui me fascinaient – principalement les déplacements désespérés des femmes au cours des derniers mois de la seconde guerre mondiale pour atteindre les lignes britanniques et américaines avant l'arrivée de l'armée soviétique. Je l'ai proposé à plusieurs éditeurs, mais aucun n'était preneur.
Des années plus tard, en 2005, j'ai lu "Armageddon" de Max Hastings son compte-rendu non romanesque de la dernière année de la Seconde Guerre Mondiale en Allemagne, et je suis tombé sur des références à des scènes qui m'étaient familières. Puis je me suis rendu compte que j'avais lu ces mêmes faits dans ce journal six ans auparavant. J'ai demandé à mon ami si je pouvais le relire. Quand je l'ai revu, j'ai décidé que je voulais écrire un roman situé dans cette période, et c'est ainsi que j'ai commencé une partie de la recherche la plus intense (et l'écriture) de ma carrière professionnelle.
Skeletons at the Feast est un roman d'amour, un triangle d'amour, en fait qui se passe en Pologne et en Allemagne dans les six derniers mois de la Seconde Guerre Mondiale.
Les personnages ? Il y a Anna Emmerich, 18 ans, une fille d'aristocrates prussiens qui étaient à l'origine satisfaits quand leur propriété massive redevint allemande en 1939, mais qui découvrirent au cours des cinq années suivantes ce que signifiait réellement pour la gestion nazie leur district rural.
Il y a son amoureux, Callum Finella, un prisonnier de guerre de 20 ans, qui a été détaché du stalag dans sa ferme familiale comme travailleur forcé. Et il y a un caporal de la Wehrmacht de 26 ans, que les deux autres connaissent sous le nom de Manfred – mais qui est en réalité un chanteur, un Juif allemand qui s'est débrouillé pour oser s'échapper d'un train à destination d'Auschwitz, et qui a depuis lors saboté l'effort de guerre nazi.
Le roman raconte la plus longue journée de leur vie. Leur essai de croiser les rescapés du troisième Reich, de Varsovie au Rhin s'il le faut, pour atteindre les lignes britanniques et américaines.
K.M.- Nous avons discuté du rôle que le Vermont a joué dans votre œuvre. Qu'en est-il du rôle que vos parents et votre famille élargie ont joué, et de celui que votre épouse et votre fille jouent maintenant ? Comment diffusent-elles votre œuvre ?
C.B.- Ma mère s'est éteinte en 1995. Et mes parents – mon père naturellement depuis 1995 – vivent à des milliers de kilomètres depuis 1988. Il est certain que mon père est fier de moi. Ma mère l'était jusqu'à sa mort. Mais je ne dirais pas qu'ils ont influencé ma décision de devenir écrivain. Ils aimaient et soutenaient, et lisaient tout ce qu'un enfant pouvait désirer de ses parents. Mais ils ne furent pas un facteur conscient de ce que je faisais ou des sujets que je choisissais pour mes romans.
Ma femme et ma fille, en revanche, on joué un rôle critique dans mon travail. Ma femme est une éditrice merveilleuse et patiente. Elle, et Shaye Areheart (mon éditeur à Random House) sont les deux premiers lecteurs de tout ce que j'écris. J'apprécie énormément le jugement de ma femme.
Et le fait d'être parent a considérablement changé ce que j'écris. Voyez les romans tels que "les Sages-Femmes" et "Before you know Kindness", et le "Buffalo Soldier". Etre parent a été très important pour eux. Ils n'existeraient pas si ne n'avais pas eu la chance d'avoir ma fille. Et la petite fille dans "The Law of Similars" ? Mais, c'est ma petite fille quand elle avait trois ou quatre ans.
K.M.- Parlez-nous de vos souvenirs de jeunesse qui vous plaisent le plus..
C.B. J'ai eu une enfance classique de banlieue des années 60-70. J'ai grandi dans différentes banlieues à problèmes juste à l'extérieur de New York City (avec un détour de trois ans à Miami, Fla). Quand j'ai lu "Le Chien noir du Destin" de Peter Balakian, j'ai perçu les échos de ma propre enfance.
Nous avons aussi beaucoup déménagé, cependant, et à une certaine période, j'ai été dans quatre écoles différentes en quatre ans. Et ainsi, bien que mon enfance ne fût pas mauvaise, elle ne rassembla pas autour de moi beaucoup d'amis une fois que j'eus terminé ma 6ème année. Le fait est que mes amis ont changé par nécessité presque chaque année, depuis la 7ème année.
Mes souvenirs favoris, dans le désordre, sont:
Jouer au baseball dans la Little League de Stamford, Conn.;
Lire pour la première fois Johnny Tremain et " To Kill a Mocking Bird" et "April Morning".
Rendre visite à mes grands-parents à Tuckhahoe, N.Y. et écouter Léo Bohjalian – mon grand-père jouer du oud, après avoir perdu sa femme dans une piscine. Je peux encore sentir les beureks de ma grand'mère.
Organiser des cartes de baseball dans mon salon avant les orages;
Voler partout dans des aéroplanes
Etre follement effrayé par les films suivants: "The Birds (Les oiseaux) "The Haunting" et "Psycho".
K.M. – Vous avez écrit des articles pour Burlington Free Press depuis environ 17 ans maintenant. Parlez-nous de cette expérience.
C.B. J'aime bien écrire des articles, sinon je ne le ferais pas. J'écris habituellement à la fin de la semaine, et c'est un charmant répit de mon roman, qui peut être parfois sombre. Cela ne veut pas dire que je n'aborde pas des sujets graves dans mes colonnes à l'occasion. Je le fais. J'ai écrit par exemple, sur la mort de ma mère, sur le changement du climat dans le monde, et sur la guerre en Irak. Mais généralement, c'est une occasion d'explorer quelque chose de personnel, ou quelque chose qui me fait sourire.
Et alors que les gens me disent que ça doit être stressant de rédiger un article chaque semaine, ça ne l'est pas vraiment. C'est beaucoup moins stressant qu'un roman. Le secret ? J'essaie de ne jamais perdre de vue le fait que quelques heures après la parution de l'article le dimanche matin, il aide soit à allumer le feu dans le poêle à bois soit à être étalé sous la litière du chat.
http://www.armenweb.org/espaces/louise/reportages/chris-bohjalian.html
Saturday, December 22, 2007
An Interview with Chris Bohjalian
Critically Acclaimed Novelist Talks about His Life and Work
By Khatchig Mouradian
The Armeian Weekly
December 22-29, 2007
Chris Bohjalian is the critically acclaimed author of 11 novels, several of which have become New York Times bestsellers. His novels include Midwives (a Publishers Weekly Best Book and an Oprah’s Book Club selection), Before You Know Kindness and The Double Bind. His work has been translated to 20 languages. Bohjalian graduated from Amherst College, and lives in Vermont with his wife and daughter.
Bohjalian’s articles have appeared in Cosmopolitan, Reader’s Digest and the Boston Globe Sunday Magazine. He has been a columnist for Gannett’s Burlington Free Press since 1992.
In this interview, conducted earlier this month, Bohjalian talks about his novels and columns, as well as passions and memories.
* * *
Khatchig Mouradian—You moved to Vermont from New York after an unpleasant experience involving a taxi. How would Chris Bohjalian the novelist in New York have been different from Chris Bohjalian the novelist in Vermont in terms of inspiration and issues you raise in your novels?
Chris Bohjalian—Novelists talk with an agonizing amount of hubris about how they found their voice. The reality, however, is that I did indeed find mine in Vermont. Vermont is a fascinating microcosm for issues that have relevance everywhere—the environment vs. development, alternative vs. traditional medicine, all the baggage that we bring to gender and sexual orientation—and it is so small that it is possible to bring these issues to life on a scale that is human, recognizable and profoundly accessible. For instance, I would never have written a book about the literal and metaphoric place of birth in our culture (Midwives), if I had remained in Manhattan. After all, home birth isn’t a part of the dialogue. Nor would have I written a vaguely eco-novel such as Water Witches—and it’s interesting to note that I wrote that novel in 1993 (it was published in 1995), years before we were focused on global climate change the way we are now. It’s not that I am especially prescient —but in some ways Vermont is.
Even a novel such as The Double Bind, which explores themes that I would have been likely to come across in New York—including, of course, mental illness and homelessness—was informed by Vermont. It was easy to research the subject at the state psychiatric hospital and one of the correctional facilities, as well find therapists and social workers who were available to help me, because we are just so small. A phone call here and a phone call there, and I was able to line up the necessary interviews.
Now, I love New York. I get back there often, and half of Before You Know Kindness is set there. But I believe I have found subjects in Vermont that are more in keeping with my strengths as a stylist.
K.M.—How do you decide what issues to tackle in your novels? Talk about the process of writing a novel.
C.B.—Invariably the inspiration is something in my personal life: Someone I have met or something I have heard or something I have seen.
The Double Bind may be as good an example as any. The novel had its origins in December 2003, when Rita Markley, the executive director of Burlington’s homeless shelter, shared with me a box of old photographs. The black-and-white images had been taken by a once-homeless photographer who had died in the apartment building her organization had found for him. His name was Bob “Soupy” Campbell.
The photos were remarkable, both because of Campbell’s evident talent and because of the subject matter. I recognized the performers—musicians, comedians, actors—and newsmakers in many of them.
I write a weekly column for the “Burlington Free Press,” which was why Rita wanted me to see the photos. She thought they might make for an interesting story, and she was absolutely right: I wrote about Campbell in December 2003, researching his life and accomplishments and why he might have wound up homeless, and to this day it remains one of my favorite essays I’ve written for the paper. I had celebrated Campbell’s talents (which were extensive) and I had reminded people of the very fine line that separates so many of us from being homeless. But then I thought I was done with the subject.
Six months later, in June 2004, I reread The Great Gatsby. I love that novel. Few writers crafted sentences as consistently luminescent as Fitzgerald or understood class and culture and longing as well.
Then I went for a bike ride on a dirt road deep in a canopy of woods. My wife had heard a story on the radio that day that advised parents to tell their children the following: If someone ever tried to abduct them while they were riding their bikes, they should hold onto the handlebars for dear life. It’s more difficult to abduct someone and throw them into the back of a car or a van if they are firmly attached to their bike. The geometry just doesn’t work.
As I rode, I started thinking about Bob Campbell for the first time in months, and I was thinking about him in regard to The Great Gatsby. Why? Perhaps it’s because we always see The Great Gatsby through a haze of black and white photographs—Campbell’s medium. And, of course, The Great Gatsby is a jazz age novel—and Campbell photographed a lot of jazz musicians.
And so the idea for The Double Bind formed in my head on that dirt road. I knew precisely how a book would begin and—for the only time in my life—I knew precisely how it would end.
Of course, this also meant I know A and Z, but not the 24 letters in between. That meant I had a different set of problems to solve. I wrote four drafts before I could even begin to seriously edit it: A Henry James-ian third person draft; then a first person draft narrated by Laurel Estabrook (the main character); then a draft with multiple first person narrators; and, finally, a draft that was third person subjective—less cold and omniscient than that initial version. This draft worked in ways the earlier ones hadn’t. Only then was I able to start refining and tightening the novel.
K.M.—Women figure prominently in many of your novels. Talk about the challenge of writing a novel like Midwives or The Double Bind, where delving into the psyche of the characters is key.
C.B.—I wish I could say there was a specific process, but I don’t find writing about women that different from writing about men. In each case, it’s an act of imagination. How would a person respond to a specific event or moment? What is an individual experiencing or thinking? What are people seeing or hearing?
In the last decade, I have written novels or scenes within novels from the perspectives of (among others) a midwife, a transsexual lesbian, a vigorous female senior citizen, an African-American foster child, a 10-year-old girl, an 18-year-old female Prussian aristocrat in 1945, a young Jewish man from Germany who has jumped off a train on the way to a death camp in 1943, and a variety of balding middle-aged men. I actually found this last category—the balding middle-aged men who are like me—the least interesting.
K.M.—Talk about your upcoming novel, Skeletons at the Feast.
C.B.—This novel is a departure—and it was creatively the most satisfying thing I have done in my life. (That doesn’t mean it’s any good or I got anything right—just that it was a struggle and it was rewarding.)
Back in 1999, the father of a girl in my daughter’s kindergarten class asked me if I would read an unpublished diary his grandmother had left behind. His mother had just translated it from German into English and typed it up. We’re good friends, and so I was happy to take a look at it.
The diary chronicled this woman’s life on a massive estate and farm in East Prussia, and there was a lot in it that fascinated me—especially the desperate journey the women made in the last months of the Second World War to reach the British and American liners ahead of the Soviet army. I shared it with some editors, but there weren’t any takers.
Years later, in 2005, I read Max Hastings’ Armageddon, his non-fiction account of the last year of the Second World War in Germany, and I kept coming across references to scenes that were familiar. And then I realized why: I had read of similar occurrences in that diary six years earlier. I asked my friend if I could see it again. When I reread it, I decided I wanted to write a novel set in the period, and thus began some of the most intense research (and writing) of my professional career.
Skeletons at the Feast is a love story—a love triangle, really, set in Poland and Germany in the last six months of World War Two.
The characters? There is 18-year-old Anna Emmerich, the daughter of Prussian aristocrats who were originally pleased when their massive estate once more became a part of Germany in 1939, but who discovered over the next five years what Nazi management really meant for their rural district.
There is her lover, Callum Finella, a 20-year-old prisoner-of-war who was brought from the stalag to her family’s farm as forced labor. And there is a 26-year-old Wehrmacht corporal who the pair know as Manfred—but who is, in reality, Uri Singer, a German Jew who managed a daring escape from a train bound for Auschwitz, and who has been sabotaging the Nazi war effort ever since.
The novel chronicles the longest journey of their lives: Their attempt to cross the remnants of the Third Reich, from Warsaw to the Rhine if necessary, to reach the British and American lines.
K.M.—We discussed the role Vermont played in your work. What about the role your parents and extended family played, and the role your wife and daughter play now? How do they inform your work?
C.B.—My mother passed away in 1995. And my parents—my father, of course, since 1995— have lived thousands of miles away since 1988. Certainly my father is proud of me. My mother was until she died. But I wouldn’t say they were instrumental in my decision to become a writer. They were loving and supportive and literate —everything a child could want from parents. But they were not a conscious factor in what I do or the subjects I choose for my fiction.
My wife and my daughter, however, play critical roles in my work. My wife is a wondrous and patient editor: She, along with Shaye Areheart (my editor at Random House), are the first two readers of all that I pen. I value my wife’s judgment enormously.
And being a parent has monumentally changed what I write. Look at novels such as Midwives and Before You Know Kindness and The Buffalo Soldier. Being a parent was pivotal to them.
C.B.—I had a classically 1960s/1970s suburban childhood. I grew up in a variety of Cheever-esque dysfunctional suburbs just outside of New York City, (with a three-year detour to Miami, Fla.). When I read Peter Balakian’s Black Dog of Fate, I saw echoes of my own childhood.
We also moved a lot, however, and in one period I went to four different schools in four years. And so while my childhood wasn’t bad, it didn’t revolve around great friends once I finished 6th grade. The fact is, my friends changed by necessity almost every year from 7th grade on.
My favorite memories, in no apparent order, are:
Playing Little League baseball in Stamford, Conn.;
Reading Johnny Tremain and To Kill a Mockingbird and April Morning for the first time;
Visiting my grandparents in Tuckahoe, N.Y., and listening to Leo Bohjalian—my grandfather—play the oud, after losing to his wife in pool. I can still smell my grandmother’s beregs;
Organizing baseball cards in my living room before thunderstorms;
Flying anywhere on airplanes;
Being scared silly by the following movies: “The Birds,” “The Haunting” and “Psycho.”
K.M.—You have been writing a column for Burlington Free Press for almost 17 years now. Talk about that experience.
C.B.—I enjoy writing the column. Otherwise, I wouldn’t do it. I usually write it at the end of the week, and it’s a nice respite from my fiction, which can be rather dark. That doesn’t mean that I don’t address serious issues in my column on occasion: I do. I have, for instance, written about the death of my mother, global climate change and the war in Iraq. But usually it’s an opportunity either to explore something personal or something that makes me smile.
And while people tell me that it must be a lot of pressure to turn out a column every single week, it really isn’t. It’s a lot less pressure than a novel. The secret? I try never to lose sight of the fact that a few hours after the column runs in the newspaper on Sunday morning, it is either helping to light a fire in a wood stove or lining the bottom of a cat’s litter box.
By Khatchig Mouradian
The Armeian Weekly
December 22-29, 2007
Chris Bohjalian is the critically acclaimed author of 11 novels, several of which have become New York Times bestsellers. His novels include Midwives (a Publishers Weekly Best Book and an Oprah’s Book Club selection), Before You Know Kindness and The Double Bind. His work has been translated to 20 languages. Bohjalian graduated from Amherst College, and lives in Vermont with his wife and daughter.
Bohjalian’s articles have appeared in Cosmopolitan, Reader’s Digest and the Boston Globe Sunday Magazine. He has been a columnist for Gannett’s Burlington Free Press since 1992.
In this interview, conducted earlier this month, Bohjalian talks about his novels and columns, as well as passions and memories.
* * *
Khatchig Mouradian—You moved to Vermont from New York after an unpleasant experience involving a taxi. How would Chris Bohjalian the novelist in New York have been different from Chris Bohjalian the novelist in Vermont in terms of inspiration and issues you raise in your novels?
Chris Bohjalian—Novelists talk with an agonizing amount of hubris about how they found their voice. The reality, however, is that I did indeed find mine in Vermont. Vermont is a fascinating microcosm for issues that have relevance everywhere—the environment vs. development, alternative vs. traditional medicine, all the baggage that we bring to gender and sexual orientation—and it is so small that it is possible to bring these issues to life on a scale that is human, recognizable and profoundly accessible. For instance, I would never have written a book about the literal and metaphoric place of birth in our culture (Midwives), if I had remained in Manhattan. After all, home birth isn’t a part of the dialogue. Nor would have I written a vaguely eco-novel such as Water Witches—and it’s interesting to note that I wrote that novel in 1993 (it was published in 1995), years before we were focused on global climate change the way we are now. It’s not that I am especially prescient —but in some ways Vermont is.
Even a novel such as The Double Bind, which explores themes that I would have been likely to come across in New York—including, of course, mental illness and homelessness—was informed by Vermont. It was easy to research the subject at the state psychiatric hospital and one of the correctional facilities, as well find therapists and social workers who were available to help me, because we are just so small. A phone call here and a phone call there, and I was able to line up the necessary interviews.
Now, I love New York. I get back there often, and half of Before You Know Kindness is set there. But I believe I have found subjects in Vermont that are more in keeping with my strengths as a stylist.
K.M.—How do you decide what issues to tackle in your novels? Talk about the process of writing a novel.
C.B.—Invariably the inspiration is something in my personal life: Someone I have met or something I have heard or something I have seen.
The Double Bind may be as good an example as any. The novel had its origins in December 2003, when Rita Markley, the executive director of Burlington’s homeless shelter, shared with me a box of old photographs. The black-and-white images had been taken by a once-homeless photographer who had died in the apartment building her organization had found for him. His name was Bob “Soupy” Campbell.
The photos were remarkable, both because of Campbell’s evident talent and because of the subject matter. I recognized the performers—musicians, comedians, actors—and newsmakers in many of them.
I write a weekly column for the “Burlington Free Press,” which was why Rita wanted me to see the photos. She thought they might make for an interesting story, and she was absolutely right: I wrote about Campbell in December 2003, researching his life and accomplishments and why he might have wound up homeless, and to this day it remains one of my favorite essays I’ve written for the paper. I had celebrated Campbell’s talents (which were extensive) and I had reminded people of the very fine line that separates so many of us from being homeless. But then I thought I was done with the subject.
Six months later, in June 2004, I reread The Great Gatsby. I love that novel. Few writers crafted sentences as consistently luminescent as Fitzgerald or understood class and culture and longing as well.
Then I went for a bike ride on a dirt road deep in a canopy of woods. My wife had heard a story on the radio that day that advised parents to tell their children the following: If someone ever tried to abduct them while they were riding their bikes, they should hold onto the handlebars for dear life. It’s more difficult to abduct someone and throw them into the back of a car or a van if they are firmly attached to their bike. The geometry just doesn’t work.
As I rode, I started thinking about Bob Campbell for the first time in months, and I was thinking about him in regard to The Great Gatsby. Why? Perhaps it’s because we always see The Great Gatsby through a haze of black and white photographs—Campbell’s medium. And, of course, The Great Gatsby is a jazz age novel—and Campbell photographed a lot of jazz musicians.
And so the idea for The Double Bind formed in my head on that dirt road. I knew precisely how a book would begin and—for the only time in my life—I knew precisely how it would end.
Of course, this also meant I know A and Z, but not the 24 letters in between. That meant I had a different set of problems to solve. I wrote four drafts before I could even begin to seriously edit it: A Henry James-ian third person draft; then a first person draft narrated by Laurel Estabrook (the main character); then a draft with multiple first person narrators; and, finally, a draft that was third person subjective—less cold and omniscient than that initial version. This draft worked in ways the earlier ones hadn’t. Only then was I able to start refining and tightening the novel.
K.M.—Women figure prominently in many of your novels. Talk about the challenge of writing a novel like Midwives or The Double Bind, where delving into the psyche of the characters is key.
C.B.—I wish I could say there was a specific process, but I don’t find writing about women that different from writing about men. In each case, it’s an act of imagination. How would a person respond to a specific event or moment? What is an individual experiencing or thinking? What are people seeing or hearing?
In the last decade, I have written novels or scenes within novels from the perspectives of (among others) a midwife, a transsexual lesbian, a vigorous female senior citizen, an African-American foster child, a 10-year-old girl, an 18-year-old female Prussian aristocrat in 1945, a young Jewish man from Germany who has jumped off a train on the way to a death camp in 1943, and a variety of balding middle-aged men. I actually found this last category—the balding middle-aged men who are like me—the least interesting.
K.M.—Talk about your upcoming novel, Skeletons at the Feast.
C.B.—This novel is a departure—and it was creatively the most satisfying thing I have done in my life. (That doesn’t mean it’s any good or I got anything right—just that it was a struggle and it was rewarding.)
Back in 1999, the father of a girl in my daughter’s kindergarten class asked me if I would read an unpublished diary his grandmother had left behind. His mother had just translated it from German into English and typed it up. We’re good friends, and so I was happy to take a look at it.
The diary chronicled this woman’s life on a massive estate and farm in East Prussia, and there was a lot in it that fascinated me—especially the desperate journey the women made in the last months of the Second World War to reach the British and American liners ahead of the Soviet army. I shared it with some editors, but there weren’t any takers.
Years later, in 2005, I read Max Hastings’ Armageddon, his non-fiction account of the last year of the Second World War in Germany, and I kept coming across references to scenes that were familiar. And then I realized why: I had read of similar occurrences in that diary six years earlier. I asked my friend if I could see it again. When I reread it, I decided I wanted to write a novel set in the period, and thus began some of the most intense research (and writing) of my professional career.
Skeletons at the Feast is a love story—a love triangle, really, set in Poland and Germany in the last six months of World War Two.
The characters? There is 18-year-old Anna Emmerich, the daughter of Prussian aristocrats who were originally pleased when their massive estate once more became a part of Germany in 1939, but who discovered over the next five years what Nazi management really meant for their rural district.
There is her lover, Callum Finella, a 20-year-old prisoner-of-war who was brought from the stalag to her family’s farm as forced labor. And there is a 26-year-old Wehrmacht corporal who the pair know as Manfred—but who is, in reality, Uri Singer, a German Jew who managed a daring escape from a train bound for Auschwitz, and who has been sabotaging the Nazi war effort ever since.
The novel chronicles the longest journey of their lives: Their attempt to cross the remnants of the Third Reich, from Warsaw to the Rhine if necessary, to reach the British and American lines.
K.M.—We discussed the role Vermont played in your work. What about the role your parents and extended family played, and the role your wife and daughter play now? How do they inform your work?
C.B.—My mother passed away in 1995. And my parents—my father, of course, since 1995— have lived thousands of miles away since 1988. Certainly my father is proud of me. My mother was until she died. But I wouldn’t say they were instrumental in my decision to become a writer. They were loving and supportive and literate —everything a child could want from parents. But they were not a conscious factor in what I do or the subjects I choose for my fiction.
My wife and my daughter, however, play critical roles in my work. My wife is a wondrous and patient editor: She, along with Shaye Areheart (my editor at Random House), are the first two readers of all that I pen. I value my wife’s judgment enormously.
And being a parent has monumentally changed what I write. Look at novels such as Midwives and Before You Know Kindness and The Buffalo Soldier. Being a parent was pivotal to them.
They wouldn’t exist if I hadn’t been blessed with my daughter. And the little girl in The Law of Similars? Well, that is my little girl at three and four.
K.M.—Talk about memories from your youth that you cherish most.
K.M.—Talk about memories from your youth that you cherish most.
C.B.—I had a classically 1960s/1970s suburban childhood. I grew up in a variety of Cheever-esque dysfunctional suburbs just outside of New York City, (with a three-year detour to Miami, Fla.). When I read Peter Balakian’s Black Dog of Fate, I saw echoes of my own childhood.
We also moved a lot, however, and in one period I went to four different schools in four years. And so while my childhood wasn’t bad, it didn’t revolve around great friends once I finished 6th grade. The fact is, my friends changed by necessity almost every year from 7th grade on.
My favorite memories, in no apparent order, are:
Playing Little League baseball in Stamford, Conn.;
Reading Johnny Tremain and To Kill a Mockingbird and April Morning for the first time;
Visiting my grandparents in Tuckahoe, N.Y., and listening to Leo Bohjalian—my grandfather—play the oud, after losing to his wife in pool. I can still smell my grandmother’s beregs;
Organizing baseball cards in my living room before thunderstorms;
Flying anywhere on airplanes;
Being scared silly by the following movies: “The Birds,” “The Haunting” and “Psycho.”
K.M.—You have been writing a column for Burlington Free Press for almost 17 years now. Talk about that experience.
C.B.—I enjoy writing the column. Otherwise, I wouldn’t do it. I usually write it at the end of the week, and it’s a nice respite from my fiction, which can be rather dark. That doesn’t mean that I don’t address serious issues in my column on occasion: I do. I have, for instance, written about the death of my mother, global climate change and the war in Iraq. But usually it’s an opportunity either to explore something personal or something that makes me smile.
And while people tell me that it must be a lot of pressure to turn out a column every single week, it really isn’t. It’s a lot less pressure than a novel. The secret? I try never to lose sight of the fact that a few hours after the column runs in the newspaper on Sunday morning, it is either helping to light a fire in a wood stove or lining the bottom of a cat’s litter box.
Saturday, August 18, 2007
Theft
THEFT
By Khatchig Mouradian
Creeping up the window of eternity
I just stole joy's virginity.
Pour its light into your glasses,
And while the smoke of desire
Is still rushing through my veins,
Let my ecstasy, like a newborn,
Drink right from the breasts of victory...
And behold! The neighboring roofs
Hunched with envy
Bear witness to my glory:
Creeping up the window of eternity
I just stole joy's virginity...
By Khatchig Mouradian
Creeping up the window of eternity
I just stole joy's virginity.
Pour its light into your glasses,
And while the smoke of desire
Is still rushing through my veins,
Let my ecstasy, like a newborn,
Drink right from the breasts of victory...
And behold! The neighboring roofs
Hunched with envy
Bear witness to my glory:
Creeping up the window of eternity
I just stole joy's virginity...
Answer
ANSWER
By Khatchig Mouradian
You talk to me of passion,
Of lines dripping with desire,
Yet nothing is left but ashes...
I've rented to resignation
The vacant apartment of Fire.
With the candlelight of craze
I never found tempests tender,
But still loitered with limping days
In the subway of dusty calendars.
Do not ask me of Lust,
Of ink gushing like semen,
My words are still-born children
Who've had no chance of dreaming.
Look elsewhere for lava,
And papers dipped in craving,
Mine are sketches of withdrawal
On the canvas of lost heaven.
By Khatchig Mouradian
You talk to me of passion,
Of lines dripping with desire,
Yet nothing is left but ashes...
I've rented to resignation
The vacant apartment of Fire.
With the candlelight of craze
I never found tempests tender,
But still loitered with limping days
In the subway of dusty calendars.
Do not ask me of Lust,
Of ink gushing like semen,
My words are still-born children
Who've had no chance of dreaming.
Look elsewhere for lava,
And papers dipped in craving,
Mine are sketches of withdrawal
On the canvas of lost heaven.
Saturday, February 24, 2007
Zahrad (1924-2007)
By Khatchig Mouradian
The Armenian Weekly
February 24, 2007
It was first and foremost a loss for poetry when Zahrad passed away on Feb. 21.
Zahrad (Zareh Yaldizciyan) was born in Istanbul in 1924. His father, Movses, was a jurist, advisor and translator in the Ottoman Foreign Ministry. His mother, Ankine Vartanian, was born in Samatia.
Zahrad received his intermediate and secondary school education at the Pangalti Mekhitariste School in Istanbul, graduating in 1942. He briefly attended medical school before he discontinued his university education to work. He married Anayis Antreasian in November 1963.
From Zareh to Zahrad
“I was 18 when I started writing,” Zahrad told journalist Talin Suciyan in the last interview he gave before his death (Nokta, Jan. 25-31, 2007). “If I had signed my name under my submissions to the newspapers, my family would have nagged me to death, saying ‘You are dealing with such meaningless stuff.’ To rescue myself from such words I made up the name ‘Zahrad.’ Time passed, my real name was forgotten, and ‘Zahrad’ became well-known.”
His first book, Medz Kaghak (big city), came out in 1960 in Istanbul. Kounavor Sahmanner (colored borders, Istanbul, 1968); Gananch Hogh (green soil, Paris, 1976); Pari Yergink (kind sky, Istanbul, 1971); Meg karov yergou karoun (two springs with one stone, Istanbul, 1989); Magh me chour (a sieve of water, Istanbul, 1995); Dzayre Dzayrin (a tight fit, 2001 Istanbul); and Choure baden Ver (water up the wall, Istanbul, 2004) followed.
His poems are translated into 22 languages. Collections of his poems have been published in English (“Gigo Poems by Zahrad,” 1969, translated by Agop Hacikyan; “Zahrad, Selected Poems,” 1974, translated by Ralph Setian); in Turkish (“Zahrad: Yag Damlasi” published by Iyi Seyler, 1993, reprinted in 2000); “Yapracigi goren balik” (published by Belge, 2002); “Isigini Sondurme Sakin” published by Adam, 2004); in Georgian (1997); and a number of other languages.
Enormous Oak Tree
“I prefer individuality in poetry. However, it does not make sense to go against the esthetic understanding of the era. My first 10-15 poems were written in classical style, in which I was a master. Later, I discontinued writing in that style, not because I was unsuccessful, but in order to follow the fashion of the time. I am not talking about the fashion of the mini-skirt, long hair, parting hair from the side or from the middle…I am talking about an esthetic point of view,” he told Suciyan during the interview for Nokta.
According to Levon Ananian, the president of Armenia’s Writers’ Union, Zahrad was the “enormous oak tree” of Diasporan poetry, and his literary legacy has left a deep and lasting effect on modern Armenian poetry, both in the Diaspora and Armenia.
“Zahrad creates a world where even the darkest shadows are illuminated with compassion and humor, albeit couched in an observer’s aloofness that acts as a shield for a very sensitive soul,” said Tatul Sonentz, whose translations of Zahrad are featured on page 9.
“Let me owe you a sieve of water,” Zahrad says in one of his poems. Yet, we owe him a river of fresh, joyful water, because that’s what he was for the sweet but melancholic pond of Armenian poetry.
By Khatchig Mouradian
The Armenian Weekly
February 24, 2007
It was first and foremost a loss for poetry when Zahrad passed away on Feb. 21.
Zahrad (Zareh Yaldizciyan) was born in Istanbul in 1924. His father, Movses, was a jurist, advisor and translator in the Ottoman Foreign Ministry. His mother, Ankine Vartanian, was born in Samatia.
Zahrad received his intermediate and secondary school education at the Pangalti Mekhitariste School in Istanbul, graduating in 1942. He briefly attended medical school before he discontinued his university education to work. He married Anayis Antreasian in November 1963.
From Zareh to Zahrad
“I was 18 when I started writing,” Zahrad told journalist Talin Suciyan in the last interview he gave before his death (Nokta, Jan. 25-31, 2007). “If I had signed my name under my submissions to the newspapers, my family would have nagged me to death, saying ‘You are dealing with such meaningless stuff.’ To rescue myself from such words I made up the name ‘Zahrad.’ Time passed, my real name was forgotten, and ‘Zahrad’ became well-known.”
His first book, Medz Kaghak (big city), came out in 1960 in Istanbul. Kounavor Sahmanner (colored borders, Istanbul, 1968); Gananch Hogh (green soil, Paris, 1976); Pari Yergink (kind sky, Istanbul, 1971); Meg karov yergou karoun (two springs with one stone, Istanbul, 1989); Magh me chour (a sieve of water, Istanbul, 1995); Dzayre Dzayrin (a tight fit, 2001 Istanbul); and Choure baden Ver (water up the wall, Istanbul, 2004) followed.
His poems are translated into 22 languages. Collections of his poems have been published in English (“Gigo Poems by Zahrad,” 1969, translated by Agop Hacikyan; “Zahrad, Selected Poems,” 1974, translated by Ralph Setian); in Turkish (“Zahrad: Yag Damlasi” published by Iyi Seyler, 1993, reprinted in 2000); “Yapracigi goren balik” (published by Belge, 2002); “Isigini Sondurme Sakin” published by Adam, 2004); in Georgian (1997); and a number of other languages.
Enormous Oak Tree
“I prefer individuality in poetry. However, it does not make sense to go against the esthetic understanding of the era. My first 10-15 poems were written in classical style, in which I was a master. Later, I discontinued writing in that style, not because I was unsuccessful, but in order to follow the fashion of the time. I am not talking about the fashion of the mini-skirt, long hair, parting hair from the side or from the middle…I am talking about an esthetic point of view,” he told Suciyan during the interview for Nokta.
According to Levon Ananian, the president of Armenia’s Writers’ Union, Zahrad was the “enormous oak tree” of Diasporan poetry, and his literary legacy has left a deep and lasting effect on modern Armenian poetry, both in the Diaspora and Armenia.
“Zahrad creates a world where even the darkest shadows are illuminated with compassion and humor, albeit couched in an observer’s aloofness that acts as a shield for a very sensitive soul,” said Tatul Sonentz, whose translations of Zahrad are featured on page 9.
“Let me owe you a sieve of water,” Zahrad says in one of his poems. Yet, we owe him a river of fresh, joyful water, because that’s what he was for the sweet but melancholic pond of Armenian poetry.
Saturday, January 27, 2007
An Appreciation of William Saroyan and James H. Tashjian
Saroyan Is Your Voice
An Appreciation of William Saroyan and James H. Tashjian
By Stuart Hyde
The Armenian Weekly
January 27, 2007
Last week, I went to my Washington Mutual Branch in Bon Air to deposit some checks. After waiting in line, my turn came so I approached the available cashier and handed her my checks and deposit slip. I then looked at her face, and then her name plate to verify what my eyes saw.
“You’re Armenian.”
“Yes.”
“Then you know Saroyan.”
“Is he a customer?”
“No, he was a…”
(Cutting me off) “I’m sure I’ve never met this person…”
“No, William Saroyan, the famous writer.”
“Never heard of him.”
“William Saroyan is your voice, but have you heard it? Have you read his words?”
“He’s not my voice! I’m sure of that!”
“But he is, and you must find him. You need to be embraced by his visions of Fresno, of San Francisco, of Armenia. His voice will help you find deeper meaning to your Armenian-ness. Once you find him, you’ll want to share him with everyone! I found him years ago, but only recently did I really discover him.”
She looked at me as though I was crazy, perhaps the way Saroyan was looked at by literal-minded rubes who didn’t know a wild, but gentle genius when they saw one.
I used the back of a deposit slip to write down “William Saroyan.” I told her to check out My Name is Aram, The Human Comedy, and Peace, it’s Wonderful. I added my name and e-mail address because I was sure that when she found her Armenian voice, she’d want to know more.
She never contacted me.
Does a man who has no Armenian blood in him have the right to tell an Armenian woman that she will not become fully human until she learns to see the world through the eyes and heart of a man, now gone, who left us with thousands of words centering around him, his Uncle Aram, his mother Takoohi, his birthplace Fresno, and whose stories live on in those whose sensitivities he nurtured, whose compassion he inspired, and whose love of Armenia, Armenians and the Armenian language lived in him until his last breath?
Yes, I think I have a right to do this. It took an Englishman, Lord Elgin, to see and save the magical Parthenon frieze, neglected by Greeks for 2,000 years; and it was a Frenchman, Jean-François Champollion, who unlocked the mystery of the hieroglyphs to give us the history and wisdom of the ancient Egyptians.
I have no right to advise Armenians on any other subject, but William Saroyan is special case. Earlier I said, “only recently did I really discover him.” Before I get to that, let me explain my connection with Saroyan.
When I was a teenager, I discovered the writings of William Saroyan while a student at Fresno High School. He was 15-years-old when I was born, so when he was 30, I was ready to read his stories. If I’d known at the time that an acquaintance, Cheslie Saroyan, two years ahead of me in school, was related to him, I would have done almost anything to cultivate his friendship. Through Cheslie, I would perhaps even meet the man who gave voice to my warm quiet valley of home—the writer who turned me on to reading, to studying, to writing, and most importantly, to living freely if somewhat wildly.
As an adolescent in Fresno, I was one of many high school kids who became addicted to Saroyan early on. We couldn’t wait for each of his books to be published. We had little money, so we shared his stories (money was very scarce for us in those days), passed them around, and discussed them at great length, dissecting them in meticulous detail. Eventually, we realized that by our analyses we were treating the living Saroyan as a cadaver in a forensics class: we could see all the pieces, but they explained nothing. If we couldn’t “get” Saroyan through our feelings, our emotions, our guts, we would never get inside the magic world of this giant. So, we gave up de-anatomizing Saroyan, and let him enter our hearts.
But, I didn’t seek Cheslie out. So, I missed my first chance to meet Saroyan.
Many years later, after living through the Great Depression, World War II, the disillusionments of the ‘60s—JFK, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, Robert Kennedy, Gandhi—and after more years of studying and teaching, marriage, children and their offspring, and much, much more, I came across a dog-eared copy of Peace, It’s Wonderful and decided I’d revisit William Saroyan. I didn’t start with this book, but with a biography, A Daring Young Man.
After finishing this book, I felt the need to see if my teenage addiction to Saroyan would hold up, so I read the two books of short stories I’d saved and carried on my ship throughout the war, and again to college and grad school, treasuring them but never finding time (or perhaps the motivation) to dip into them again until now. In re-reading his stories, I was awakened to the wonder of a Fresno I’d failed to sense or appreciate growing up—a wonderment that did not escape this sensitive artist.
During this time, I was aware that Saroyan was again living in Fresno, just 200 miles south of San Francisco. It would have been easy for me to drive there, contact him, and, I’m sure, spend some time with him.
But, I didn’t. Too busy. Can’t leave right now, maybe next month. I’m needed at work. My family needs me. And so on.
On May 18, 1981, William Saroyan died. So, I missed my last chance to touch him.
I thought that was it. But this man would not let me go. One Sunday, several months ago, I went to Fort Mason, a decommissioned old military base in San Francisco Bay, to visit the Friends of the Library shop of used books, but was diverted when I saw a large sign: TODAY ONLY: BIG USED BOOK SALE, PIER 5.
I browsed through the $1.00 book tables, saw many titles I found appealing, but not enough so to bite on and, when I was just about to leave, Saroyan struck again: I saw a hard cover book I never knew existed: My Name is Saroyan.
I grabbed it, paid my buck, and left.
The book turned out to be a revelation, more than 100 stories, letters, poems and plays that Saroyan sent to the Hairenik papers in Boston over the years, beginning in 1933 and ending in 1954. Of the 97 stories, 68 had never been published aside from their appearance in the Armenian periodicals! My Name is Saroyan was edited and annotated by James H. Tashjian, who was for more than 30 years editor of the Hairenik Weekly (later the Armenian Weekly) and the Armenian Review.
In reading My Name is Saroyan, I was taken back to those Fresno days and to memories of my friends, Bob Kuyumjian (best buddy), Aurora Vartikian (I had a crush on her!), Mike Keshishian and Senor Saghatelian (outstanding football players), Arpie Ohanian, Bobbie Kevorkian (class clown), and so many more! And to the streets where I walked and rode my bike—like Saroyan, the one with no rubber on the peddles. And to the nearby small towns of Clovis, Fowler, Selma, Kingsburg, Kerman, Mendota...
I photographically relived the night Bob Kuyumjian and I snuck into Memorial Auditorium to see the original New York touring cast performance of Saroyan’s play “The Time of Your Life,” which was truly the time of my life, for I never escaped its magic, and knew from that moment on that I had to do something in the theatre. (I wound up teaching drama, and then radio and television.)
This adventure was immediately tarnished by one of my father’s co-workers. My dad came home in a stew, and came right to the point: “Did you sneak into the auditorium last night to see a play?” “Yes, Dad, I did.” I expected him to punish me for this minor crime, but that wasn’t the cause of his anger. “Dan Bradley told me he saw you sneaking into the show with an Armenian kid.” “Yeah, Dad, it was Bob Kuyumjian…” He cut me off, and went into a tirade against his co-worker because, you see, he had immense respect for the Armenians who had come to Fresno after the Turkish holocaust. So I wasn’t the target of his rage. I felt more respect for my Dad at that moment than I ever thought I could or would.
My Name is Saroyan also brought back the day in 1944, that I spent with the Saroyan clan in Long Beach, where the extended family encamped for several weeks to escape the blistering hot summer of Fresno. I was in San Pedro with my ship, getting ready to head out into the Pacific, but when I was invited to the Saroyan get-together by my friend, Dudley St. John, who was stationed at an army base nearby, I received a pass and was on my way. One of the many memorable events that day was shish kebab made in their penthouse apartment in a large galvanized metal tub!
My strongest memories of that day, though, were dozens of short but evocative stories told by the patriarch of the family—I may be wrong, but I’ve always remembered him as Uncle Aram. Most of his tales were fables or parables from the Old Country. But at one point he became very sober as he recounted memories of his family rushing ahead of armed Turkish troops on horseback, who were cutting down thousands of Armenians who only wanted to reach Musa Dagh and safety.
As much as I was enjoying the day, I was keyed up, waiting for William Saroyan’s appearance, but Dudley was wrong: Saroyan didn’t show up…
So, I missed another opportunity to meet him.
The deeper I got into My Name is Saroyan, the more I needed to contact Mr. Tashjian, to tell him how much I appreciated his assembling and annotating a book which—had he not had custody of the Saroyan papers and dedicated himself to bringing them to the public—most likely would have remained in the Armenian Weekly archives, unread, until some compulsive “neat-freak” sent them to the recycling bin to make more storage space.
My Name is Saroyan brings to life an enigmatic genius, a man who revealed himself in every word he wrote, yet one who remained a mystery in many ways when he lived and when he died. In this book, touching indications of his insecurities show up that are never found in his cocky, arrogant public stance. The Saroyan most people thought they knew, but didn’t, is revealed in these pages.
In A Fistfight for Armenia, written in 1933, he gives a furious picture of a child who wants only to live in peace, yet can’t escape the pervasive contempt shown to Armenians by many of “Fresno’s finest.” The story is told by “Caspar,” obviously the alter ego of Saroyan himself.
“One evening he and Reuben Paul sat on the porch of his home talking when a group of six or seven boys came up, running and shouting they had been insulted. Roy Sommers, who had boxed in the ring of the American Legion, had insulted them. ‘He called us dirty Armenians,’ said Ara George, a boy of eight, who began to tremble and burst into tears.”
Later, as Caspar and Sommers fight, a girl in the small crowd yells, “We’ll massacre you like the Turks,” she said. “You just watch. We’ll cut you to pieces the way the Turks did.”
As far as I know, Saroyan never in his stories revealed the ache that must have lived in him every day, growing up in Fresno. The public knows only of his deep love for his home town: “We drank the beer and my cousin cranked the car and we got in and drove out of the hills into the warm, quiet, valley that was our home in the world, in time, in the time of living.”
The world knows William Saroyan as the brilliant writer who became suddenly famous with the publication of The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze. After that, people think, everything was roses. But, in My Name is Saroyan, we learn about his subsequent struggles. Perhaps his story most revered by the multitudes is The Human Comedy. Here is what he wrote to the editor of the Hairenik Weekly in Jan. 1942:
“I took the manuscript to Metro and they read it without talking about money. A couple of days later one of Hollywood’s greatest authorities called me in and said, ‘Saroyan, we’ll give you $25,000 for that ream of junk, even though we don’t know what we’ll do with it; we’re doing you this favor since we called you, you didn’t call us.’ I was not at all impressed at his generosity. I asked ‘what’s your next best offer?’ ‘Not a sou more’ he said (educated Hollywood people always use ‘sou’ for ‘cent.’”
Were it not for editor James Tashjian, the world would never have been told about his constant struggle to preserve his income and his integrity.
These are but two examples of the many revelations in My Name is Saroyan. The millions of readers whose lives were enriched by his words and his wisdom will never see Saroyan in all his dimensions without reading this gift from James Tashjian.
On Nov. 21, 2006, I sent this e-mail to the Armenian Weekly:
Hello. I am writing to learn more about Mr. Tashjian. I recently came across “My Name is Saroyan,” and am incredibly grateful for this book and for the vision of Mr. Tashjian who made it possible.
I grew up in Fresno, and was one of many high school kids who discovered Saroyan early on. We couldn’t wait for each of his books to be published; we read them, shared them, and discussed them at great length and dissected them in amazing detail.
Anyway, I hope Mr. Tashjian is alive and well, and if so I’d like to hear from him.
Sincerely,
Stuart Hyde
Emeritus Professor,
San Francisco State University
On Nov. 30, I received this response:
Dear Professor Stuart Hyde,
I am sorry to inform you that James Tashjian has just passed away. I wanted to visit him as well to wish him well and also printed your email so that he got a chance to read it, but he passed away before we had a chance to visit him. I do not know Mr. Tashjian in person—I moved to the U.S. a few months ago—but all those who knew James Tashjian and worked with him only have good words about the man.
Regards,
Khatchig Mouradian
Editor, The Armenian Weekly
So, once again, I missed an opportunity—not to touch William Saroyan, because I’d already lost that chance—but to at least get nearer to him through the man who expanded and deepened my knowledge and understanding of this great author, the editor who made William Saroyan a more complete figure in the Pantheon of great storytellers.
I end by paraphrasing what I said to that teller at the Washington Mutual Branch, but what I say now to readers of the Armenian Weekly:
William Saroyan is your voice, but have you heard it? Have you read his words? You may need to be embraced by his visions of Fresno, of San Francisco, of Armenia. His voice may even help you find deeper meaning to your Armenian-ness. Once you find him, you’ll want to share him with everyone! I found him years ago, but only recently did I really discover him.”
Thank you, James H. Tashjian.
An Appreciation of William Saroyan and James H. Tashjian
By Stuart Hyde
The Armenian Weekly
January 27, 2007
Last week, I went to my Washington Mutual Branch in Bon Air to deposit some checks. After waiting in line, my turn came so I approached the available cashier and handed her my checks and deposit slip. I then looked at her face, and then her name plate to verify what my eyes saw.
“You’re Armenian.”
“Yes.”
“Then you know Saroyan.”
“Is he a customer?”
“No, he was a…”
(Cutting me off) “I’m sure I’ve never met this person…”
“No, William Saroyan, the famous writer.”
“Never heard of him.”
“William Saroyan is your voice, but have you heard it? Have you read his words?”
“He’s not my voice! I’m sure of that!”
“But he is, and you must find him. You need to be embraced by his visions of Fresno, of San Francisco, of Armenia. His voice will help you find deeper meaning to your Armenian-ness. Once you find him, you’ll want to share him with everyone! I found him years ago, but only recently did I really discover him.”
She looked at me as though I was crazy, perhaps the way Saroyan was looked at by literal-minded rubes who didn’t know a wild, but gentle genius when they saw one.
I used the back of a deposit slip to write down “William Saroyan.” I told her to check out My Name is Aram, The Human Comedy, and Peace, it’s Wonderful. I added my name and e-mail address because I was sure that when she found her Armenian voice, she’d want to know more.
She never contacted me.
Does a man who has no Armenian blood in him have the right to tell an Armenian woman that she will not become fully human until she learns to see the world through the eyes and heart of a man, now gone, who left us with thousands of words centering around him, his Uncle Aram, his mother Takoohi, his birthplace Fresno, and whose stories live on in those whose sensitivities he nurtured, whose compassion he inspired, and whose love of Armenia, Armenians and the Armenian language lived in him until his last breath?
Yes, I think I have a right to do this. It took an Englishman, Lord Elgin, to see and save the magical Parthenon frieze, neglected by Greeks for 2,000 years; and it was a Frenchman, Jean-François Champollion, who unlocked the mystery of the hieroglyphs to give us the history and wisdom of the ancient Egyptians.
I have no right to advise Armenians on any other subject, but William Saroyan is special case. Earlier I said, “only recently did I really discover him.” Before I get to that, let me explain my connection with Saroyan.
When I was a teenager, I discovered the writings of William Saroyan while a student at Fresno High School. He was 15-years-old when I was born, so when he was 30, I was ready to read his stories. If I’d known at the time that an acquaintance, Cheslie Saroyan, two years ahead of me in school, was related to him, I would have done almost anything to cultivate his friendship. Through Cheslie, I would perhaps even meet the man who gave voice to my warm quiet valley of home—the writer who turned me on to reading, to studying, to writing, and most importantly, to living freely if somewhat wildly.
As an adolescent in Fresno, I was one of many high school kids who became addicted to Saroyan early on. We couldn’t wait for each of his books to be published. We had little money, so we shared his stories (money was very scarce for us in those days), passed them around, and discussed them at great length, dissecting them in meticulous detail. Eventually, we realized that by our analyses we were treating the living Saroyan as a cadaver in a forensics class: we could see all the pieces, but they explained nothing. If we couldn’t “get” Saroyan through our feelings, our emotions, our guts, we would never get inside the magic world of this giant. So, we gave up de-anatomizing Saroyan, and let him enter our hearts.
But, I didn’t seek Cheslie out. So, I missed my first chance to meet Saroyan.
Many years later, after living through the Great Depression, World War II, the disillusionments of the ‘60s—JFK, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, Robert Kennedy, Gandhi—and after more years of studying and teaching, marriage, children and their offspring, and much, much more, I came across a dog-eared copy of Peace, It’s Wonderful and decided I’d revisit William Saroyan. I didn’t start with this book, but with a biography, A Daring Young Man.
After finishing this book, I felt the need to see if my teenage addiction to Saroyan would hold up, so I read the two books of short stories I’d saved and carried on my ship throughout the war, and again to college and grad school, treasuring them but never finding time (or perhaps the motivation) to dip into them again until now. In re-reading his stories, I was awakened to the wonder of a Fresno I’d failed to sense or appreciate growing up—a wonderment that did not escape this sensitive artist.
During this time, I was aware that Saroyan was again living in Fresno, just 200 miles south of San Francisco. It would have been easy for me to drive there, contact him, and, I’m sure, spend some time with him.
But, I didn’t. Too busy. Can’t leave right now, maybe next month. I’m needed at work. My family needs me. And so on.
On May 18, 1981, William Saroyan died. So, I missed my last chance to touch him.
I thought that was it. But this man would not let me go. One Sunday, several months ago, I went to Fort Mason, a decommissioned old military base in San Francisco Bay, to visit the Friends of the Library shop of used books, but was diverted when I saw a large sign: TODAY ONLY: BIG USED BOOK SALE, PIER 5.
I browsed through the $1.00 book tables, saw many titles I found appealing, but not enough so to bite on and, when I was just about to leave, Saroyan struck again: I saw a hard cover book I never knew existed: My Name is Saroyan.
I grabbed it, paid my buck, and left.
The book turned out to be a revelation, more than 100 stories, letters, poems and plays that Saroyan sent to the Hairenik papers in Boston over the years, beginning in 1933 and ending in 1954. Of the 97 stories, 68 had never been published aside from their appearance in the Armenian periodicals! My Name is Saroyan was edited and annotated by James H. Tashjian, who was for more than 30 years editor of the Hairenik Weekly (later the Armenian Weekly) and the Armenian Review.
In reading My Name is Saroyan, I was taken back to those Fresno days and to memories of my friends, Bob Kuyumjian (best buddy), Aurora Vartikian (I had a crush on her!), Mike Keshishian and Senor Saghatelian (outstanding football players), Arpie Ohanian, Bobbie Kevorkian (class clown), and so many more! And to the streets where I walked and rode my bike—like Saroyan, the one with no rubber on the peddles. And to the nearby small towns of Clovis, Fowler, Selma, Kingsburg, Kerman, Mendota...
I photographically relived the night Bob Kuyumjian and I snuck into Memorial Auditorium to see the original New York touring cast performance of Saroyan’s play “The Time of Your Life,” which was truly the time of my life, for I never escaped its magic, and knew from that moment on that I had to do something in the theatre. (I wound up teaching drama, and then radio and television.)
This adventure was immediately tarnished by one of my father’s co-workers. My dad came home in a stew, and came right to the point: “Did you sneak into the auditorium last night to see a play?” “Yes, Dad, I did.” I expected him to punish me for this minor crime, but that wasn’t the cause of his anger. “Dan Bradley told me he saw you sneaking into the show with an Armenian kid.” “Yeah, Dad, it was Bob Kuyumjian…” He cut me off, and went into a tirade against his co-worker because, you see, he had immense respect for the Armenians who had come to Fresno after the Turkish holocaust. So I wasn’t the target of his rage. I felt more respect for my Dad at that moment than I ever thought I could or would.
My Name is Saroyan also brought back the day in 1944, that I spent with the Saroyan clan in Long Beach, where the extended family encamped for several weeks to escape the blistering hot summer of Fresno. I was in San Pedro with my ship, getting ready to head out into the Pacific, but when I was invited to the Saroyan get-together by my friend, Dudley St. John, who was stationed at an army base nearby, I received a pass and was on my way. One of the many memorable events that day was shish kebab made in their penthouse apartment in a large galvanized metal tub!
My strongest memories of that day, though, were dozens of short but evocative stories told by the patriarch of the family—I may be wrong, but I’ve always remembered him as Uncle Aram. Most of his tales were fables or parables from the Old Country. But at one point he became very sober as he recounted memories of his family rushing ahead of armed Turkish troops on horseback, who were cutting down thousands of Armenians who only wanted to reach Musa Dagh and safety.
As much as I was enjoying the day, I was keyed up, waiting for William Saroyan’s appearance, but Dudley was wrong: Saroyan didn’t show up…
So, I missed another opportunity to meet him.
The deeper I got into My Name is Saroyan, the more I needed to contact Mr. Tashjian, to tell him how much I appreciated his assembling and annotating a book which—had he not had custody of the Saroyan papers and dedicated himself to bringing them to the public—most likely would have remained in the Armenian Weekly archives, unread, until some compulsive “neat-freak” sent them to the recycling bin to make more storage space.
My Name is Saroyan brings to life an enigmatic genius, a man who revealed himself in every word he wrote, yet one who remained a mystery in many ways when he lived and when he died. In this book, touching indications of his insecurities show up that are never found in his cocky, arrogant public stance. The Saroyan most people thought they knew, but didn’t, is revealed in these pages.
In A Fistfight for Armenia, written in 1933, he gives a furious picture of a child who wants only to live in peace, yet can’t escape the pervasive contempt shown to Armenians by many of “Fresno’s finest.” The story is told by “Caspar,” obviously the alter ego of Saroyan himself.
“One evening he and Reuben Paul sat on the porch of his home talking when a group of six or seven boys came up, running and shouting they had been insulted. Roy Sommers, who had boxed in the ring of the American Legion, had insulted them. ‘He called us dirty Armenians,’ said Ara George, a boy of eight, who began to tremble and burst into tears.”
Later, as Caspar and Sommers fight, a girl in the small crowd yells, “We’ll massacre you like the Turks,” she said. “You just watch. We’ll cut you to pieces the way the Turks did.”
As far as I know, Saroyan never in his stories revealed the ache that must have lived in him every day, growing up in Fresno. The public knows only of his deep love for his home town: “We drank the beer and my cousin cranked the car and we got in and drove out of the hills into the warm, quiet, valley that was our home in the world, in time, in the time of living.”
The world knows William Saroyan as the brilliant writer who became suddenly famous with the publication of The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze. After that, people think, everything was roses. But, in My Name is Saroyan, we learn about his subsequent struggles. Perhaps his story most revered by the multitudes is The Human Comedy. Here is what he wrote to the editor of the Hairenik Weekly in Jan. 1942:
“I took the manuscript to Metro and they read it without talking about money. A couple of days later one of Hollywood’s greatest authorities called me in and said, ‘Saroyan, we’ll give you $25,000 for that ream of junk, even though we don’t know what we’ll do with it; we’re doing you this favor since we called you, you didn’t call us.’ I was not at all impressed at his generosity. I asked ‘what’s your next best offer?’ ‘Not a sou more’ he said (educated Hollywood people always use ‘sou’ for ‘cent.’”
Were it not for editor James Tashjian, the world would never have been told about his constant struggle to preserve his income and his integrity.
These are but two examples of the many revelations in My Name is Saroyan. The millions of readers whose lives were enriched by his words and his wisdom will never see Saroyan in all his dimensions without reading this gift from James Tashjian.
On Nov. 21, 2006, I sent this e-mail to the Armenian Weekly:
Hello. I am writing to learn more about Mr. Tashjian. I recently came across “My Name is Saroyan,” and am incredibly grateful for this book and for the vision of Mr. Tashjian who made it possible.
I grew up in Fresno, and was one of many high school kids who discovered Saroyan early on. We couldn’t wait for each of his books to be published; we read them, shared them, and discussed them at great length and dissected them in amazing detail.
Anyway, I hope Mr. Tashjian is alive and well, and if so I’d like to hear from him.
Sincerely,
Stuart Hyde
Emeritus Professor,
San Francisco State University
On Nov. 30, I received this response:
Dear Professor Stuart Hyde,
I am sorry to inform you that James Tashjian has just passed away. I wanted to visit him as well to wish him well and also printed your email so that he got a chance to read it, but he passed away before we had a chance to visit him. I do not know Mr. Tashjian in person—I moved to the U.S. a few months ago—but all those who knew James Tashjian and worked with him only have good words about the man.
Regards,
Khatchig Mouradian
Editor, The Armenian Weekly
So, once again, I missed an opportunity—not to touch William Saroyan, because I’d already lost that chance—but to at least get nearer to him through the man who expanded and deepened my knowledge and understanding of this great author, the editor who made William Saroyan a more complete figure in the Pantheon of great storytellers.
I end by paraphrasing what I said to that teller at the Washington Mutual Branch, but what I say now to readers of the Armenian Weekly:
William Saroyan is your voice, but have you heard it? Have you read his words? You may need to be embraced by his visions of Fresno, of San Francisco, of Armenia. His voice may even help you find deeper meaning to your Armenian-ness. Once you find him, you’ll want to share him with everyone! I found him years ago, but only recently did I really discover him.”
Thank you, James H. Tashjian.
Saturday, December 23, 2006
Three Poems
Three Poems by By Khatchig Mouradian
Translated by Tatul Sonentz
The Armenian Weekly
December 23-30, 2006
PITY
Already the newspeak Pegasus
Pines wasted in the stable
It never ventured a visit
To its native clouds.
Tomorrow when its body
Is committed to the soil
And its soul to radiance,
We shall long lament the fact
That it was fed hay instead of words.
(1999)
TOAST
Tonight as I dock
The boat of silence
Endless words old and new
Thrash restless in my net.
Tomorrow morning
Dear reader
I shall bring to your table
The flaming loot of treasured momentos
Ablaze with longings.
(Oct. 15, 2000)
ETERNAL LOVE
Love was eternal—
An Eternity of mere months…
And now, memories frolicking
A few fortnights in the backyard of dreams,
Dreams limping along behind the pause,
Come ever closer in single file
To sprinkle a fistful of soil…
They approach one by one
To sprinkle a handful of dust…
As you slip into the new infinity
Patched up by your fancy
Your love still prompts my thoughts
From the great beyond…
(June 13, 2000)
Translated by Tatul Sonentz
The Armenian Weekly
December 23-30, 2006
PITY
Already the newspeak Pegasus
Pines wasted in the stable
It never ventured a visit
To its native clouds.
Tomorrow when its body
Is committed to the soil
And its soul to radiance,
We shall long lament the fact
That it was fed hay instead of words.
(1999)
TOAST
Tonight as I dock
The boat of silence
Endless words old and new
Thrash restless in my net.
Tomorrow morning
Dear reader
I shall bring to your table
The flaming loot of treasured momentos
Ablaze with longings.
(Oct. 15, 2000)
ETERNAL LOVE
Love was eternal—
An Eternity of mere months…
And now, memories frolicking
A few fortnights in the backyard of dreams,
Dreams limping along behind the pause,
Come ever closer in single file
To sprinkle a fistful of soil…
They approach one by one
To sprinkle a handful of dust…
As you slip into the new infinity
Patched up by your fancy
Your love still prompts my thoughts
From the great beyond…
(June 13, 2000)
Saturday, October 28, 2006
Paulo Coelho’s Journey Among the Armenians
An Alchemist’s Pilgrimage
Best-Selling Author Paulo Coelho’s Journey Among the Armenians
By Khatchig Mouradian
The Armenian Weekly
October 28, 2006
“This book, telling the story of a shepherd boy named Santiago, is about following your dreams,” said my Chinese friend.
“Its message is powerful and simple: If you really believe in something, the whole universe conspires with you to achieve it. Take it to Beirut with you and read it,” she continued.
Thousands of miles away from home, I was being offered a book I had on my own bookshelf, but had never read. Thus, on September 10, 2000, in Shenyang, China, my story with The Alchemist had begun.
As I was reading the book on the plane on my way back, I felt I could easily relate to the message of the novel: We had to go to far away lands, sometimes, to find treasures hidden in our backyard.
“I will translate this book to Armenian one day,” I thought, as the captain was announcing our arrival at the Beirut International Airport.
In October 2003, I started interviewing writers, artists and academics from around the world for the Lebanese-Armenian daily newspaper Aztag. “My first interviewee ought to be the author of The Alchemist,” I thought.
I emailed the author’s literary agency requesting an interview and, much to my surprise, I received a positive response. One of the top best-selling authors of the world had agreed to share his thoughts with a small community newspaper in Beirut.
The last question I asked Paulo Coelho was whether there were plans to translate his book, The Alchemist, to Armenian. Already translated into 54 languages, I felt it was time Armenians read the book in their mother tongue. He expressed hope that a publishing house would be interested in such an endeavor.
On October 30, the interview appeared in Aztag. A few days later, I received a phone call from the Hamazkayin publishing house in Beirut. “We would love to have The Alchemist translated to Armenian. Would you be interested in translating it?” asked the voice on the other side.
I remembered my Chinese friend, Paulo Coelho’s quote about wanting something, and the wish I had expressed on my flight to Beirut. When we obtained the rights from Coelho’s literary agency, the shepherd boy Santiago in me was thrilled.
A year later, I was holding the first copy of my translation of The Alchemist. I flipped to page 5 where the Translator’s Foreword appeared, titled “the 55th [translation].” There, I had told my story with the book, without knowing it was not yet over. In a few hours, I had a plane to catch to Yerevan, where I would be joined by Paulo Coelho himself for a series of book events.
The Pilgrimage
A large crowd of journalist, photographers and cameramen had gathered right outside the VIP Lounge at the Zvartnots Airport in Yerevan. “Where is Khatchig?” asked the man in dark clothes coming out of the VIP room. As I approached and we embraced, he made his first statement to the media: “He is too young to be a translator.”
“And too old to be Santiago,” I thought.
“The Pilgrim has arrived to the land of Pilgrimages: to yerkir Hayastan,” wrote the daily Hayastani Hanrapetudyun a few days later.
As Armenia was bracing for the greatest literary events in its history, Coelho had other things in mind. He had an Armenian driver, he went to Armenian restaurants in Paris, he had met many Armenians in the Diaspora and heard so much about their heritage and their country, and now, he was on a pilgrimage to discover both, first-hand.
We strolled in the streets of Yerevan that night. The following day, when he was asked about his impressions of the city, he said that the buildings and streets are almost the same everywhere around the world. “It is the people that make the difference, and my best impression was the people,” he added.
Weeks before his arrival, as we were preparing the program of his week-long visit, Coelho’s literary agency stressed that the author wanted to spend time with the people, with his readers, and that official meetings had to be minimal. We ended up including lunch with the president of Armenia Robert Kocharian at the Parajanov Museum, a visit to the Catholicos of All Armenians Karekin II at Etchmiadzin, and a meeting with the Minister of Culture Hovig Hoveyan in the program.
On October 6, 2004, the book-launching event dedicated to the translation into Armenian of The Alchemist took place at the Writers’ Union Great Hall. Organized by Hamazkayin and the Writers’ Union of Armenia, the event was a huge success. The hall was packed with people hours before the event, and hundreds of latecomers waited outside, pushing at the gates that were closed because the hall couldn’t handle any more people.
In my introductory speech, I told my story with The Alchemist, beginning, as always, in China. I said, “Just like Paulo, I, too, believe we have to go to far away lands, sometimes, to find treasures hidden in our backyard. And for us, Diaspora Armenians, whose grandparents had to walk through deserts in much harsher conditions than Santiago did in his quest, the real treasures are hidden here, in Armenia, whether we realize it or not.”
In his speech, Coelho, who Publishing Trends had declared the number one best-selling author a year before, also alluded to the Armenian Diaspora saying he believed that one day, Diaspora Armenians would return, like rain, to the land of their ancestors, bringing with them all that they have learned and accomplished.
“At the Writers’ Union Hall there was no room to cast a needle,” wrote the weekly Yerkir in its coverage of the event. “We cannot recall any other time when that hall was packed like that.” In its history, the Writers’ Union had witnessed such an event only once, and that was during the visit of William Saroyan to Yerevan, wrote Grakan Tert.
Coelho’s second meeting with Armenian readers came two days later in the Tcharents Hall at Yerevan State University. Some 900 people packed the hall, with many sitting on the floor or leaning against the walls. Coelho said he did not want to give a speech and, instead, invited 10 students to the podium and gave them each a chance to ask a question.
I was translating Paulo’s answers to Armenian. At one point, replying to a question on his most recent novel Eleven Minutes, Paulo started talking about sex. While I was having difficulty translating words like “masturbation,” “orgasm”, “penis” and “vagina,” and blushing every now and then, the audience was having a blast. Rarely, if ever, had a speaker talked so openly about sex on that podium.
Asked whether at some point he would write a novel on Armenia, Coelho said he never plans in advance what to write about. He compared himself to a sailor who sets out without having a specific destination. “I do not know if I will write a novel about Armenia,” he said. “But Armenia wrote a novel in my heart.”
A day later, the daily Azg wrote: “From the meetings of Paulo Coelho with the public in Yerevan, it became clear that it is not true to say the Armenian reader has became indifferent towards literature.”
In the following days, Coelho lay wreaths at the Armenian Genocide memorial, visited the Genocide Museum, and planted a tree at the memorial garden in Dzidzernagapert. He also went to Oshagan on Holy Translators’ Day, and lay a flower on the tomb of Mesrob Mashdots, the creator of the Armenian alphabet.
He was particularly impressed by the fact that the Armenians sanctified their translators, who enlightened their people after the alphabet was discovered. He said he had toured the world and had never encountered such a practice. Coelho later wrote an article, syndicated in newspapers around the world, on his visit to Armenia and specifically his impressions from the Holy Translators’ Day.
It was impossible to walk even a few steps on the streets in Yerevan without encountering an admirer of Coelho’s work asking for an autograph. He patiently autographed books for everyone. The utmost respect and love he showed to each and every reader was heartwarming indeed.
Once, when we were visiting the vernissage, the open-air art market in Yerevan, a painter in his 70s approached and hugged the author, giving him a painting as a gift. “Tell the world we love life, and we will prevail in the face of economic and political difficulties,” said the painter. His words, full of determination, reminded me of Paulo’s literary style: simple, but powerful, inspiring and heartwarming.
Before we knew it, we were at the Zvartnots Airport again. “Partir, c’est mourir un peu” (Leaving is a bit like dying), say the French. “Heratsman mech el ga mi veratarts” (There is a return in every departure), says an Armenian song. I believe in the latter.
***
Recently, I asked Paulo to send an email and wish a happy birthday to a female friend of mine, who is a great fan of his.
“A man in love asks, and a man who respects love obeys,” he wrote her a day later. “Happy Birthday!” As always, Paulo had found the best way to reach the heart of his readers.
Best-Selling Author Paulo Coelho’s Journey Among the Armenians
By Khatchig Mouradian
The Armenian Weekly
October 28, 2006
“This book, telling the story of a shepherd boy named Santiago, is about following your dreams,” said my Chinese friend.
“Its message is powerful and simple: If you really believe in something, the whole universe conspires with you to achieve it. Take it to Beirut with you and read it,” she continued.
Thousands of miles away from home, I was being offered a book I had on my own bookshelf, but had never read. Thus, on September 10, 2000, in Shenyang, China, my story with The Alchemist had begun.
As I was reading the book on the plane on my way back, I felt I could easily relate to the message of the novel: We had to go to far away lands, sometimes, to find treasures hidden in our backyard.
“I will translate this book to Armenian one day,” I thought, as the captain was announcing our arrival at the Beirut International Airport.
In October 2003, I started interviewing writers, artists and academics from around the world for the Lebanese-Armenian daily newspaper Aztag. “My first interviewee ought to be the author of The Alchemist,” I thought.
I emailed the author’s literary agency requesting an interview and, much to my surprise, I received a positive response. One of the top best-selling authors of the world had agreed to share his thoughts with a small community newspaper in Beirut.
The last question I asked Paulo Coelho was whether there were plans to translate his book, The Alchemist, to Armenian. Already translated into 54 languages, I felt it was time Armenians read the book in their mother tongue. He expressed hope that a publishing house would be interested in such an endeavor.
On October 30, the interview appeared in Aztag. A few days later, I received a phone call from the Hamazkayin publishing house in Beirut. “We would love to have The Alchemist translated to Armenian. Would you be interested in translating it?” asked the voice on the other side.
I remembered my Chinese friend, Paulo Coelho’s quote about wanting something, and the wish I had expressed on my flight to Beirut. When we obtained the rights from Coelho’s literary agency, the shepherd boy Santiago in me was thrilled.
A year later, I was holding the first copy of my translation of The Alchemist. I flipped to page 5 where the Translator’s Foreword appeared, titled “the 55th [translation].” There, I had told my story with the book, without knowing it was not yet over. In a few hours, I had a plane to catch to Yerevan, where I would be joined by Paulo Coelho himself for a series of book events.
The Pilgrimage
A large crowd of journalist, photographers and cameramen had gathered right outside the VIP Lounge at the Zvartnots Airport in Yerevan. “Where is Khatchig?” asked the man in dark clothes coming out of the VIP room. As I approached and we embraced, he made his first statement to the media: “He is too young to be a translator.”
“And too old to be Santiago,” I thought.
“The Pilgrim has arrived to the land of Pilgrimages: to yerkir Hayastan,” wrote the daily Hayastani Hanrapetudyun a few days later.
As Armenia was bracing for the greatest literary events in its history, Coelho had other things in mind. He had an Armenian driver, he went to Armenian restaurants in Paris, he had met many Armenians in the Diaspora and heard so much about their heritage and their country, and now, he was on a pilgrimage to discover both, first-hand.
We strolled in the streets of Yerevan that night. The following day, when he was asked about his impressions of the city, he said that the buildings and streets are almost the same everywhere around the world. “It is the people that make the difference, and my best impression was the people,” he added.
Weeks before his arrival, as we were preparing the program of his week-long visit, Coelho’s literary agency stressed that the author wanted to spend time with the people, with his readers, and that official meetings had to be minimal. We ended up including lunch with the president of Armenia Robert Kocharian at the Parajanov Museum, a visit to the Catholicos of All Armenians Karekin II at Etchmiadzin, and a meeting with the Minister of Culture Hovig Hoveyan in the program.
On October 6, 2004, the book-launching event dedicated to the translation into Armenian of The Alchemist took place at the Writers’ Union Great Hall. Organized by Hamazkayin and the Writers’ Union of Armenia, the event was a huge success. The hall was packed with people hours before the event, and hundreds of latecomers waited outside, pushing at the gates that were closed because the hall couldn’t handle any more people.
In my introductory speech, I told my story with The Alchemist, beginning, as always, in China. I said, “Just like Paulo, I, too, believe we have to go to far away lands, sometimes, to find treasures hidden in our backyard. And for us, Diaspora Armenians, whose grandparents had to walk through deserts in much harsher conditions than Santiago did in his quest, the real treasures are hidden here, in Armenia, whether we realize it or not.”
In his speech, Coelho, who Publishing Trends had declared the number one best-selling author a year before, also alluded to the Armenian Diaspora saying he believed that one day, Diaspora Armenians would return, like rain, to the land of their ancestors, bringing with them all that they have learned and accomplished.
“At the Writers’ Union Hall there was no room to cast a needle,” wrote the weekly Yerkir in its coverage of the event. “We cannot recall any other time when that hall was packed like that.” In its history, the Writers’ Union had witnessed such an event only once, and that was during the visit of William Saroyan to Yerevan, wrote Grakan Tert.
Coelho’s second meeting with Armenian readers came two days later in the Tcharents Hall at Yerevan State University. Some 900 people packed the hall, with many sitting on the floor or leaning against the walls. Coelho said he did not want to give a speech and, instead, invited 10 students to the podium and gave them each a chance to ask a question.
I was translating Paulo’s answers to Armenian. At one point, replying to a question on his most recent novel Eleven Minutes, Paulo started talking about sex. While I was having difficulty translating words like “masturbation,” “orgasm”, “penis” and “vagina,” and blushing every now and then, the audience was having a blast. Rarely, if ever, had a speaker talked so openly about sex on that podium.
Asked whether at some point he would write a novel on Armenia, Coelho said he never plans in advance what to write about. He compared himself to a sailor who sets out without having a specific destination. “I do not know if I will write a novel about Armenia,” he said. “But Armenia wrote a novel in my heart.”
A day later, the daily Azg wrote: “From the meetings of Paulo Coelho with the public in Yerevan, it became clear that it is not true to say the Armenian reader has became indifferent towards literature.”
In the following days, Coelho lay wreaths at the Armenian Genocide memorial, visited the Genocide Museum, and planted a tree at the memorial garden in Dzidzernagapert. He also went to Oshagan on Holy Translators’ Day, and lay a flower on the tomb of Mesrob Mashdots, the creator of the Armenian alphabet.
He was particularly impressed by the fact that the Armenians sanctified their translators, who enlightened their people after the alphabet was discovered. He said he had toured the world and had never encountered such a practice. Coelho later wrote an article, syndicated in newspapers around the world, on his visit to Armenia and specifically his impressions from the Holy Translators’ Day.
It was impossible to walk even a few steps on the streets in Yerevan without encountering an admirer of Coelho’s work asking for an autograph. He patiently autographed books for everyone. The utmost respect and love he showed to each and every reader was heartwarming indeed.
Once, when we were visiting the vernissage, the open-air art market in Yerevan, a painter in his 70s approached and hugged the author, giving him a painting as a gift. “Tell the world we love life, and we will prevail in the face of economic and political difficulties,” said the painter. His words, full of determination, reminded me of Paulo’s literary style: simple, but powerful, inspiring and heartwarming.
Before we knew it, we were at the Zvartnots Airport again. “Partir, c’est mourir un peu” (Leaving is a bit like dying), say the French. “Heratsman mech el ga mi veratarts” (There is a return in every departure), says an Armenian song. I believe in the latter.
***
Recently, I asked Paulo to send an email and wish a happy birthday to a female friend of mine, who is a great fan of his.
“A man in love asks, and a man who respects love obeys,” he wrote her a day later. “Happy Birthday!” As always, Paulo had found the best way to reach the heart of his readers.
Tuesday, March 14, 2006
A Storyteller's Quest
A Storyteller's Quest
by Khatchig Mouradian
ZNet
March 14, 2006
"Anatolia has always been a mosaic of flowers,
filling the world with flowers and light.
I want it to be the same today"
Yasar Kemal
The Anatolia Yasar Kemal, arguably the greatest Turkish author of the 20th century, wants to see and the Anatolia he can actually see today cannot possibly be considered the same region of Turkey. What was a century ago a mosaic of ethnic and religious groups (Armenians, Assyrians, Greeks, Turks, Kurds, etc.) is now almost homogenized through blood and destruction, and the memory of many of the peoples that once dwelled in the region of Eastern Turkey is being negligently allowed to pass into oblivion.
A number of Turkish intellectuals are striving to push Turkey to face its past and recognize the "mosaic of flowers" that Anatolia once was. Will their vision one day become reality? Much depends on the changes currently taking place in Turkey. Novelist Elif Shafak, one of the courageous intellectuals struggling today for the preservation of memory and recognition of cultural diversity, spoke to me of Turkey today and the Turkey she would like to see tomorrow.
The Two Faces of Turkey
"I feel connected to so many things in Turkey, especially in Istanbul. The city, the people, the customs of women, the enchanting world of superstitions, my grandmother's almost magical cosmos, my mother's humanism, and the warmth, the sincerity of the people," Shafak tells me, speaking of her native country. "At the same time I feel no connection whatsoever to its main ideology, its state structure and army," she notes.
Turkey is the country of opposites which oftentimes, defying the laws of physics, repel one another. Eastern and Western, Islamic and secular at the same time, the country is torn between democracy and dictatorship, memory and amnesia. These dualities, bordering on schizophrenia, are unsettling for Shafak, an author of five published novels. "I think there are two undercurrents in Turkey, both very old. One is nationalist, exclusivist, xenophobic and reactionary. The other is cosmopolitan, Sufi, humanist, embracing. It is the second tide that I feel connected to," she says.
Not surprisingly, the first tide she mentions is not at all happy with her line of conduct. Hate-mail and accusations of being a traitor to her country have become commonplace for the young writer.
"The nationalist discourse in Turkey-- just like the Republicans in the USA-- is that if you are criticizing your government, you do not like your nation. This is a lie. Only and only if you care about something you will reflect upon it, give it further thought. I care about Turkey. It hurts me to be accused of hating my country," she explains.
However, Elif Shafak, who spent most of her childhood and adolescence in Europe and later moved to Turkey to pursue her studies, is anything but wrong when she points out that her country has come a long way in the last few years. "There are very important changes underway in Turkey. Sometimes, in the West, Turkey looks more black-and-white than it really is, but the fact remains that Turkey's civil society is multifaceted and very dynamic. Especially over the past two decades there have been fundamental transformations," she says.
"The bigger the change, the deeper the panic of those who want to preserve the status quo," she adds.
A cornered tiger is the fiercest, however, as an Eastern proverb says. This is why the prospect of membership to the European Union (EU) is deemed necessary by the country’s cosmopolitan undercurrent, which is struggling against the status quo. For decades, those, who have dared to challenge the official rhetoric on a wide spectrum of issues, have faced oppression, persecution, and imprisonment, and they know well that the only way not to take the country back in time is to keep it going in the direction of the EU. Shafak herself believes that Turkey's bid to join the EU "is an important process for progressive forces both within and outside the country". She adds: "Definitely the whole process will reinforce democracy, human rights and minority rights. It will diminish the role of the state apparatuses, and most importantly the shadow of the military in the political arena."
Dealing with the Turkish Society's 'Underbelly'
"For me, the recognition of 1915 is connected to my love for democracy and human rights," says Shafak. 1915 is the year when the Turkish government embarked on a genocidal campaign to exterminate the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire. This topic remained the greatest of all taboos in Turkey until very recently.
Although the Armenian genocide is acknowledged by most genocide scholars and many parliaments around the world, the Turkish government's official stand maintains that the Armenians were not subjected to a state sponsored annihilation process that killed more than a million and a half people in 1915-16. The Armenians were, the Turkish official viewpoint argues, the victims of ethnic strife or war and starvation, just like many Muslims living in the Ottoman Empire during WWI. Moreover, according to the official historiography in Turkey, the number of the Armenians that died due to these "unfortunate events" is exaggerated.
Like a growing number of fellow Turkish intellectuals, it is against this policy of denial that Elif Shafak rages. "If we had been able to face the atrocities committed against the Armenians in Anatolia, it would have been more difficult for the Turkish state to commit atrocities against the Kurds," she argues.
"A society based on amnesia cannot have a mature democracy," she adds.
Why did she choose to tackle this very sensitive issue, knowing well that harassment and threats were inevitable? "I am a storyteller. If I cannot "feel" other people's pain and grief, I better quit what I am doing. So there is an emotional aspect for me in that I have always felt connected to those pushed to the margins and silenced rather than those at the center", she notes. "This is the pattern in each and every one of my novels; I deal with Turkish society's underbelly."
Her upcoming novel, "The Bastard of Istanbul", is no exception. The Turkish translation of the novel, titled “Baba ve Pic” was released in Turkey on March 8, 2006. The original novel in English will be released in the U.S. in January 2007 out of Penguin/Viking press. "The novel is highly critical of the sexist and nationalist fabric of Turkish society. It is the story of four generations of women in Istanbul. At some point their stories converge with the story of an Armenian woman and, thereby, an Armenian-American family. I have used this family in San Francisco and the family in Istanbul as mirrors," she explains. "Basically, the novel testifies to the struggle of amnesia and memory. It deals with painful pasts both at the individual and collective level," she adds.
The Turkey she would like to see in 2015, a century after the Armenian genocide, stands in deep contrast to the Turkey the world has known for the better part of the past century. It is "a Turkey that is part of EU, a Turkey where women do not get killed on the basis of "family honor", a Turkey where there is no gender discrimination, no violations against minorities; a Turkey which is not xenophobic, homophobic, where each and every individual is treated as valuably as the reflection of the Jamal side of God, its beauty."
It would be hard to disagree with Shafak that only in the Turkey she envisions can cosmopolitism overshadow nationalism and remembrance emerge victorious over denial.
by Khatchig Mouradian
ZNet
March 14, 2006
"Anatolia has always been a mosaic of flowers,
filling the world with flowers and light.
I want it to be the same today"
Yasar Kemal
The Anatolia Yasar Kemal, arguably the greatest Turkish author of the 20th century, wants to see and the Anatolia he can actually see today cannot possibly be considered the same region of Turkey. What was a century ago a mosaic of ethnic and religious groups (Armenians, Assyrians, Greeks, Turks, Kurds, etc.) is now almost homogenized through blood and destruction, and the memory of many of the peoples that once dwelled in the region of Eastern Turkey is being negligently allowed to pass into oblivion.
A number of Turkish intellectuals are striving to push Turkey to face its past and recognize the "mosaic of flowers" that Anatolia once was. Will their vision one day become reality? Much depends on the changes currently taking place in Turkey. Novelist Elif Shafak, one of the courageous intellectuals struggling today for the preservation of memory and recognition of cultural diversity, spoke to me of Turkey today and the Turkey she would like to see tomorrow.
The Two Faces of Turkey
"I feel connected to so many things in Turkey, especially in Istanbul. The city, the people, the customs of women, the enchanting world of superstitions, my grandmother's almost magical cosmos, my mother's humanism, and the warmth, the sincerity of the people," Shafak tells me, speaking of her native country. "At the same time I feel no connection whatsoever to its main ideology, its state structure and army," she notes.
Turkey is the country of opposites which oftentimes, defying the laws of physics, repel one another. Eastern and Western, Islamic and secular at the same time, the country is torn between democracy and dictatorship, memory and amnesia. These dualities, bordering on schizophrenia, are unsettling for Shafak, an author of five published novels. "I think there are two undercurrents in Turkey, both very old. One is nationalist, exclusivist, xenophobic and reactionary. The other is cosmopolitan, Sufi, humanist, embracing. It is the second tide that I feel connected to," she says.
Not surprisingly, the first tide she mentions is not at all happy with her line of conduct. Hate-mail and accusations of being a traitor to her country have become commonplace for the young writer.
"The nationalist discourse in Turkey-- just like the Republicans in the USA-- is that if you are criticizing your government, you do not like your nation. This is a lie. Only and only if you care about something you will reflect upon it, give it further thought. I care about Turkey. It hurts me to be accused of hating my country," she explains.
However, Elif Shafak, who spent most of her childhood and adolescence in Europe and later moved to Turkey to pursue her studies, is anything but wrong when she points out that her country has come a long way in the last few years. "There are very important changes underway in Turkey. Sometimes, in the West, Turkey looks more black-and-white than it really is, but the fact remains that Turkey's civil society is multifaceted and very dynamic. Especially over the past two decades there have been fundamental transformations," she says.
"The bigger the change, the deeper the panic of those who want to preserve the status quo," she adds.
A cornered tiger is the fiercest, however, as an Eastern proverb says. This is why the prospect of membership to the European Union (EU) is deemed necessary by the country’s cosmopolitan undercurrent, which is struggling against the status quo. For decades, those, who have dared to challenge the official rhetoric on a wide spectrum of issues, have faced oppression, persecution, and imprisonment, and they know well that the only way not to take the country back in time is to keep it going in the direction of the EU. Shafak herself believes that Turkey's bid to join the EU "is an important process for progressive forces both within and outside the country". She adds: "Definitely the whole process will reinforce democracy, human rights and minority rights. It will diminish the role of the state apparatuses, and most importantly the shadow of the military in the political arena."
Dealing with the Turkish Society's 'Underbelly'
"For me, the recognition of 1915 is connected to my love for democracy and human rights," says Shafak. 1915 is the year when the Turkish government embarked on a genocidal campaign to exterminate the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire. This topic remained the greatest of all taboos in Turkey until very recently.
Although the Armenian genocide is acknowledged by most genocide scholars and many parliaments around the world, the Turkish government's official stand maintains that the Armenians were not subjected to a state sponsored annihilation process that killed more than a million and a half people in 1915-16. The Armenians were, the Turkish official viewpoint argues, the victims of ethnic strife or war and starvation, just like many Muslims living in the Ottoman Empire during WWI. Moreover, according to the official historiography in Turkey, the number of the Armenians that died due to these "unfortunate events" is exaggerated.
Like a growing number of fellow Turkish intellectuals, it is against this policy of denial that Elif Shafak rages. "If we had been able to face the atrocities committed against the Armenians in Anatolia, it would have been more difficult for the Turkish state to commit atrocities against the Kurds," she argues.
"A society based on amnesia cannot have a mature democracy," she adds.
Why did she choose to tackle this very sensitive issue, knowing well that harassment and threats were inevitable? "I am a storyteller. If I cannot "feel" other people's pain and grief, I better quit what I am doing. So there is an emotional aspect for me in that I have always felt connected to those pushed to the margins and silenced rather than those at the center", she notes. "This is the pattern in each and every one of my novels; I deal with Turkish society's underbelly."
Her upcoming novel, "The Bastard of Istanbul", is no exception. The Turkish translation of the novel, titled “Baba ve Pic” was released in Turkey on March 8, 2006. The original novel in English will be released in the U.S. in January 2007 out of Penguin/Viking press. "The novel is highly critical of the sexist and nationalist fabric of Turkish society. It is the story of four generations of women in Istanbul. At some point their stories converge with the story of an Armenian woman and, thereby, an Armenian-American family. I have used this family in San Francisco and the family in Istanbul as mirrors," she explains. "Basically, the novel testifies to the struggle of amnesia and memory. It deals with painful pasts both at the individual and collective level," she adds.
The Turkey she would like to see in 2015, a century after the Armenian genocide, stands in deep contrast to the Turkey the world has known for the better part of the past century. It is "a Turkey that is part of EU, a Turkey where women do not get killed on the basis of "family honor", a Turkey where there is no gender discrimination, no violations against minorities; a Turkey which is not xenophobic, homophobic, where each and every individual is treated as valuably as the reflection of the Jamal side of God, its beauty."
It would be hard to disagree with Shafak that only in the Turkey she envisions can cosmopolitism overshadow nationalism and remembrance emerge victorious over denial.
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