Thursday, October 05, 2006
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GET A LOAD OF THIS!
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Bosses, bishops, and benefactors are Yervant Odian’s favorite targets too, and he is much tougher on them than I am, perhaps because concentrated as they were in Istanbul, the way beasts of prey are in a zoo, they could be observed and studied closely and at leisure.
When Ghougas effendi, the main character of FAMILY, HONOR, MORALITY (a wealthy merchant and one of the most repellent characters in all of Armenian literature), when Ghougas effendi dies a horribly slow death of a knife-wound sustained in a bordello scuffle, his funeral service is conducted “by the Patriarch, six bishops, fourteen vartabeds, and thirty-two kahanas.” In his eulogy, Odian writes, the Patriarch speaks of him as one “who enjoyed the affection and respect of the entire community…. His rectitude and unassuming nature were legendary and made of him an exemplary husband and father. His family was an altar whose sanctity he defended until his last breath. He dedicated his entire life to three principles – family, honor, and morality. Even in his generosity, which was boundless, he did his utmost to uphold these principles and consistently refused to help anyone who did not share his unwavering dedication to family, honor, and morality. To his friends and acquaintances he was a wise mentor, and to the perplexed, a lighthouse. Even a glancing acquaintance with him was enough to make the confused and lost to return onto the right path…” and so on and so forth. The Patriarch unload this verbal crap with the expertise of someone who has done it all his life; so much so that even those in the congregation, who know better, burst into tears. Who says you can’t fool all the people all the time?
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Friday, October 06, 2006
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THE USES AND ABUSES OF THE PAST
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Guenter Grass (contemporary German author and winner of the Nobel Prize): “History is a clogged toilet. We flush and flush, but the shit keeps rising.” Why is it that we Armenians are incapable of producing such a sentence?
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By ignoring the dark side of our history, we sink deeper into filth. Is it conceivable that we will wake up from this nightmare only on the day we drown?
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To pretend that we had nothing to do in shaping our destiny as a nation and by extension our identity, or to pretend the Genocide was engineered by the doubletalk of the West and the savagery of the Turks, is to admit that adopting a passive stance has become an integral part of our identity, and so far we have done nothing to expose this scandal and to combat against it.
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The average Armenian thinks all he has to do to discharge his patriotic duty is to make periodic contributions to our Panchoonies.
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The average Greek today brags about Socrates but ignores the fact that it was average Greeks like him who condemned him to death. This is true not only of Greeks but also patriots of all nations. Patriotism is unthinkable without propaganda. No one who knows and understands history says, “My country, right or wrong!”
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When Jesus said “They know not what they do,” he was talking about the average citizen who is capable of committing the most unspeakable crimes with a clear conscience on the grounds that his conduct is motivated by such selfless and noble principles as obedience to established laws and love of country. Even as he sinks deeper and deeper into filth, he pleads not guilty by reason of unawareness and ignorance.
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Saturday, October 07, 2006
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WHO LOVES ARMENIANS?
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Let us not speculate about others and the rest of the world, most of which may not even be aware of our existence, and if it is, may not give a damn whether we live or die. Let us begin with ourselves. Do Armenians love Armenians? Is an Armenian capable of loving himself? Gregory of Narek or Naregatsi (our Dante and Shakespeare combined) was not particularly fond of himself; and very much like Yervant Odian, most of our ablest writers had no illusions about their fellow countrymen. As for our partisans: the less said about them the better. You may now draw your own conclusions.
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ATHEISTS
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My guess is there are as many atheists and agnostics in the Muslim Middle East as there are in the Christian West. If they refuse to stand up and be counted, it may be because martyrdom is incompatible with negation. It is easier to die for something you believe in than for something you don’t believe in.
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ON TRUST
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On the day Muslims see a connection between religion and progress or capacity to inflict pain on others without committing suicide, they will be tempted to convert to Christianity because their need to live and to win must be greater than their trust in their mullahs.
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ON FOLLOWING ORDERS
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When the Lord ordered Abraham to butcher his own son, Abraham did not object or ask any questions. Ever since then absolute and blind obedience has been the source of some of the most unspeakable crimes against humanity.
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ON PROPAGANDA
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Everybody engages in it, why shouldn’t we? One tentative answer: It hasn’t been working for us.
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THE REALITY OF WORDS
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Truth is only a word, like god and infinity. We have no way of knowing if it exists; and if it exists, whether or not our mind can grasp it.
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BOOMERANG
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By making me a charlatan, my education provided me with the means to recognize charlatanism when I see it.
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NEGATIVE ROLE MODELS
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Great men of wisdom have said many foolish things. We who are neither great nor wise must be careful to speak only words of wisdom.
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ON HAPPINESS
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It is possible to experience brief intervals of happiness, or the illusion of it, provided one forgets yesterday’s blunders and to ignore tomorrow’s hardships.
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ON STYLE
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Even when one is brief, clear, and impossible to misunderstand, one will be misunderstood. It comes with the territory. You may choose your style but you cannot choose your readers.
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