"The most memorable remains that night and also the saddest."

“They Were, (and) are no more” (Կային, Չկան) is the title of the last chapter of Antranig Zarougian’s “The Greats and the Others” (Մեծերը եւ Միւսները) book where he casts a glimpse of the way Diaspora writers related to each other, as poets, novelists, journalists, and editors and in doing so propelled the post genocide Western Armenian literature to new heights that subsided with their passing away. The attached is my abridged translated segment from that chapter. Vahe H. Apelian

“There was a commemorative event in the evening devoted to two great Armenians who had passed away recently within the same time frame, Nigol Aghpalian¹ and Hamo Ohanjanian². Shavarsh Nartouni presided the event. Before inviting the main speaker, among a few others, he also invited me as the guest who happened to be in Paris to briefly convey my thoughts and sentiments about the great men.  

- “Pay attention to this speaker, listen to him,” told me poet Aharon Dadourian³ who happened to be sitting next to me.

         The speaker was a tall and a slender person who moved gracefully. He talked with an impeccable Armenian weighing each sentence. He was not rhetorical and did not attempt to leave an impression. A nobility permeated his overall demeanor, from his facial expression to the way he wore his dress and his tie. 

- “It’s Simamento⁴ you hear,” murmured Aharon to my ear.

Siamento? Indeed, Vahan Yerjanian is Siamento’s brother. It suddenly dawned on me why he had set up our meeting, early that day on the phone, for 11 p.m. in Café de la Paix⁵. It became obvious that he wanted us to meet after the commemorative event. Serendipity might come to my rescue, I thought, as I could secure his lawyer’s persuasion to convince Aharon, whom I had not been able to convince during the past two days. I had been tasked with a mission and was authorized to speak on behalf of the newly formed Karen Yeppe Jemaran of Aleppo that was in desperate need for a teacher who was an expert in Armenian language and literature. Aharon was the only person who had the qualifications given his expert knowledge of the classical Armenian (krapar), as well as his Armenian language and literature expertise.

I was even entrusted with the authority to sign a contractual agreement with him. But he refused to come to Aleppo. All the efforts I vested in convincing him failed. He was a strange man. He would joke in the midst of a serious conversation, or would recite in krapar, and even not shy to tell a tasteless joke. 

After the event was over, I approached Vahram and asked him if he would mind to have Aharon join us as well. 

- “On the contrary,” he said, “it is pleasant to have his company. I always feel enliven whenever I meet him.”

We were sitting in the historic restaurant on the Opera square. All of us asked for coffee when the waiter asked for our order. 

- “No,” said Yerjanian, “such a meeting could not be held over coffee alone. I am indebted to you. After I read your “Letter to Yerevan”⁶, I should have written to you. But my laziness got better hold of me. This is the time to redeem myself.”

The “redemption” was a bottle of champaign that was opened with a loud pop. I should say that it was not an ordinary champaign, neither was its cost as I happened to be privy when the evening’s account was settled.

Vahan Yerjanian was also incapable convincing Aharon to accept the offer. As a last resort I let him know his brother’s recommendation. Aharon had no job in Paris and no source of income. It was his merchant brother Kevork from London who supported him by regularly sending him monthly stipends.

- “For God’s sake, take him with you,” had told me his brother, “I will continue on sending him allowance every month. With the favorable exchange rate, he will be much better off there. He might even not need the salary you would be giving him. Let him go and be useful to the young Armenian boys and girls.”

Alas, we could not budge his stubbedness.  The only thing that our joint efforts succeeded doing was changing Aharon’s cheerfulness. He became solemn, pensive and suddenly he stood up. He was a large man with snow white hair. He pointed towards the Opera and said as if to make a declaration.

- “Do you think I am staying in Paris because of these dark stones?”  - Paris was dark in those days and did not have the brightness it has now – “or because of them?”. There were girls sitting a bit further down, “I stay here…”

He took a deep breath and looked upward as if sniffing the air and declared:

- “There is something about this place that attracts me…..”

We remained silent.

- “Excuse me, it’s getting late. I may miss my metro liner.”

And he left. The stairways that led to the metro station was not far. My last recollection of him was his snow-white hair that gradually disappeared from my view.

Decades ago Aharon was looked upon as a second Taniel Varoujan, when he made his mark in the literature in Constantinople. 

After Aharon left, a sadness came upon us and we did not speak for a while. It was I who broke the silence and asked Vahran:

- “Why don’t you write?”

He appeared dismissive as if he was being asked an unimportant question. But I knew that there was a poet that lived in him. I have read poetries in “Shant” journal in Istanbul that bore his signature. They were powerful poems and were “siamentoesque”. I could surmize why he did not write, but I wanted to hear it from him. In order not to leave my question unanswered he said

- “What to write and why to write?”

After the martyrdom of Siamento, and not long after the armistice, Vahan Yerjanian’s poems first appeared, surprising many. However,  people started gossiping that he is usurping his brother Siamento’s unpublished literary works. But when he continued to write with the same breath and with the same depth about issues and events that Siamento could not have known, such as about the assassination of Talaat, the rumors and the gossips did not abate but changed their tone claiming – “Have we not said that anyone who can put together beautiful words, could write much like Siamento?.”

Among the literary circles the prevailing supposition was that Vahan Yerjanian did not continue to write and maintained a silence just to safeguard his brother’s literary preeminence and memory. Arshag Chobanian was also of the same opinion for he had talked to me with conviction about Vahan Yerjanian’s poetic instincts. 

If that was true, it was a unique expression of a brother’s love. But I wanted to hear it from him. But he never said anything in that regard, not even a word, even though I hinted about it over again. He continued to evade the subject. 

The night was progressing. After a drizzle, the air had cleared. The late-night pedestrians were dwindling, as we were facing the imposing features of the opera building and were experiencing the effects of the champaign. In the background we could hear the arrangements of the empty chairs. The whole thing had created the moment when we let go of our guards, our hearts want to empty our inner thoughts  and our lips would lend to confession we would not have dared  to confess otherwise.

But Vahan Yerjanian did not open up. We got up and he accompanied me as we started walking towards the hotel I was staying for it was not far away, saying nothing all the way. I was the one who was carrying on a conversation, until we arrived at the door of the hotel. Up until then he had always spoken with me deferentially, addressing me in plural. There, near the door at Edouard 7, just before he said goodbye to take leave of me, he addressed me in singular and bared it all.

- “You know Zarougian”, he said, “I have always considered little Massis is an unnecessary appendage next to the Great Massis.”

He turned his back on me and walked away.

During the past forty years I have spent numerous nights in Paris but the most memorable remains that night and also the saddest.

Every time I sit at that corner of Café de la Paix, it becomes impossible for me not to remember Vahan Yerjanian with his noble gestures and gentle soul and also Aharon’s imposing height as he descended down the stairs of the metro station.

Vahan Yerjanian, that night, ceased for me being Siamento’s brother but became a man in the full sense of the word. A person who possessed a lofty soul and who did not need to have the association to a famous name to chart his course in life. 

Vahan Yerjanian, the poet who did not write, will continue to live in my soul.

Aharon, the author of magnificent books, that I have difficulty reading now.

Admirable men, both of them.

They were, are no more.

Notes 

1.      Nigol Poghosi Aghbalian (Armenian: Նիկոլ Պողոսի Աղբալեան), 1875, Tiflis – August 15, 1947, Beirut. He was an Armenian scholar, public figure and historian of literature. In 1928, he became one of the founders of Hamazkayin Association and subsequently founded the Hamazkayin Djemaran (Lyceum) in Beirut together with Levon Shant.For the rest of his life Nigol Aghpalian remained a close colleague of Levon Shant. He taught history of Armenian literature and archaic Armenian in Djemaran. 

2.     Hamazasp "Hamo" Ohanjanyan (Armenian: Համօ Օհանջանեան), 1873 Akhalkalak, 1873 – July 31, 1947, Cairo, Egypt. He  was an Armenian medical doctor, revolutionary, and politician of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation. He served as the third Prime Minister of the First Republic of Armenia from May 5 to November 23, 1920.

4.     Aharon Dadourian (in Armenian Ահարոն Տատուրեան), September 19, 1887 -  January 31, 1965. He was known by the pen name Aharon (Ահարոն), born in Ovadjek (near Constantinople, Ottoman Empire) and died in Montmorency, France was an Armenian writer and poet, teacher.

4.     Atom Yarjanian (Armenian: Ատոմ Եարճանեան), better known by his pen name Siamanto (Սիամանթօ), 15 August 1878 – August 1915. He was an influential Armenian writer, poet and national figure and an editor of Hairenik Daily. He was killed by the Ottoman authorities during the Armenian genocide.

5.     Café de la Paix (French pronunciation: ​[kafe də la pɛ]) is a famous café located on the northwest corner of the intersection of the Boulevard des Capucines and the Place de l'Opéra, in the 9th arrondissement of Paris, France.

6.     “Letter to Yerevan”, written in 1944 in response to Soviet Armenian writer Gevorg Abov's «Մենք չենք մոռացել» ("Menk chenk moratsel," "We Have Not Forgotten"), and published the following year, «Թուղթ առ Երեւան» (Tught ar Yerevan, Letter to Yerevan) made Tzarukian a prominent voice in the Armenian Diaspora almost overnight—from the Middle East to Europe and the Americas. The poem was republished more than a dozen times in various Armenian communities—including in Syria, the United States, Lebanon, and Cyprus—up until the early 1990s, and as a result became a source of inspiration for tens of thousands. 

Its translation was published by the 120-year-old Hairenik Press, as the first and only English translation of Tzarukian's “Letter to Yerevan.”

The translation was a collaborative effort between the former director of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF) and First Republic of Armenia Archives and former editor of the Armenian Review Tatul Sonentz-Papazian and former editor of the Armenian Weekly Rupen Janbazian. It features an in-depth introduction by another former editor of the Armenian Weekly and the volume’s English editor, Vahe Habeshian, as well as six original illustrations by Yerevan-based artist Meruzhan Khachatryan.”

 

“Լittle Massis is an unnecessary appendage next to the Great Massis.”

  “They Were, (and) are no more” (Կային, Չկան) is the title of the last chapter of Antranig Zarougian’s “The Greats and the Others” (Մեծերը եւ Միւսները) book where he casts a glimpse of the way Diaspora writers related to each other, as poets, novelists, journalists, and editors and in doing so propelled the post genocide Western Armenian literature to new heights that subsided with their passing away. The attached is my abridged translated segment from that chapter. Vahe H. Apelian

“There was a commemorative event in the evening devoted to two great Armenians who had passed away recently within the same time frame, Nigol Aghpalian¹ and Hamo Ohanjanian². Shavarsh Nartouni presided the event. Before inviting the main speaker, among a few others, he also invited me as the guest who happened to be in Paris to briefly convey my thoughts and sentiments about the great men.  

- “Pay attention to this speaker, listen to him,” told me poet Aharon Dadourian³ who happened to be sitting next to me.

         The speaker was a tall and a slender person who moved gracefully. He talked with an impeccable Armenian weighing each sentence. He was not rhetorical and did not attempt to leave an impression. A nobility permeated his overall demeanor, from his facial expression to the way he wore his dress and his tie. 

- “It’s Simamento⁴ you hear,” murmured Aharon to my ear.

Siamento? Indeed, Vahan Yerjanian is Siamento’s brother. It suddenly dawned on me why he had set up our meeting, early that day on the phone, for 11 p.m. in Café de la Paix⁵. It became obvious that he wanted us to meet after the commemorative event. Serendipity might come to my rescue, I thought, as I could secure his lawyer’s persuasion to convince Aharon, whom I had not been able to convince during the past two days. I had been tasked with a mission and was authorized to speak on behalf of the newly formed Karen Yeppe Jemaran of Aleppo that was in desperate need for a teacher who was an expert in Armenian language and literature. Aharon was the only person who had the qualifications given his expert knowledge of the classical Armenian (krapar), as well as his Armenian language and literature expertise.

I was even entrusted with the authority to sign a contractual agreement with him. But he refused to come to Aleppo. All the efforts I vested in convincing him failed. He was a strange man. He would joke in the midst of a serious conversation, or would recite in krapar, and even not shy to tell a tasteless joke. 

After the event was over, I approached Vahram and asked him if he would mind to have Aharon join us as well. 

- “On the contrary,” he said, “it is pleasant to have his company. I always feel enliven whenever I meet him.”

We were sitting in the historic restaurant on the Opera square. All of us asked for coffee when the waiter asked for our order. 

- “No,” said Yerjanian, “such a meeting could not be held over coffee alone. I am indebted to you. After I read your “Letter to Yerevan”⁶, I should have written to you. But my laziness got better hold of me. This is the time to redeem myself.”

The “redemption” was a bottle of champaign that was opened with a loud pop. I should say that it was not an ordinary champaign, neither was its cost as I happened to be privy when the evening’s account was settled.

Vahan Yerjanian was also incapable convincing Aharon to accept the offer. As a last resort I let him know his brother’s recommendation. Aharon had no job in Paris and no source of income. It was his merchant brother Kevork from London who supported him by regularly sending him monthly stipends.

- “For God’s sake, take him with you,” had told me his brother, “I will continue on sending him allowance every month. With the favorable exchange rate, he will be much better off there. He might even not need the salary you would be giving him. Let him go and be useful to the young Armenian boys and girls.”

Alas, we could not budge his stubbedness.  The only thing that our joint efforts succeeded doing was changing Aharon’s cheerfulness. He became solemn, pensive and suddenly he stood up. He was a large man with snow white hair. He pointed towards the Opera and said as if to make a declaration.

- “Do you think I am staying in Paris because of these dark stones?”  - Paris was dark in those days and did not have the brightness it has now – “or because of them?”. There were girls sitting a bit further down, “I stay here…”

He took a deep breath and looked upward as if sniffing the air and declared:

- “There is something about this place that attracts me…..”

We remained silent.

- “Excuse me, it’s getting late. I may miss my metro liner.”

And he left. The stairways that led to the metro station was not far. My last recollection of him was his snow-white hair that gradually disappeared from my view.

Decades ago Aharon was looked upon as a second Taniel Varoujan, when he made his mark in the literature in Constantinople. 

After Aharon left, a sadness came upon us and we did not speak for a while. It was I who broke the silence and asked Vahran:

- “Why don’t you write?”

He appeared dismissive as if he was being asked an unimportant question. But I knew that there was a poet that lived in him. I have read poetries in “Shant” journal in Istanbul that bore his signature. They were powerful poems and were “siamentoesque”. I could surmize why he did not write, but I wanted to hear it from him. In order not to leave my question unanswered he said

- “What to write and why to write?”

After the martyrdom of Siamento, and not long after the armistice, Vahan Yerjanian’s poems first appeared, surprising many. However,  people started gossiping that he is usurping his brother Siamento’s unpublished literary works. But when he continued to write with the same breath and with the same depth about issues and events that Siamento could not have known, such as about the assassination of Talaat, the rumors and the gossips did not abate but changed their tone claiming – “Have we not said that anyone who can put together beautiful words, could write much like Siamento?.”

Among the literary circles the prevailing supposition was that Vahan Yerjanian did not continue to write and maintained a silence just to safeguard his brother’s literary preeminence and memory. Arshag Chobanian was also of the same opinion for he had talked to me with conviction about Vahan Yerjanian’s poetic instincts. 

If that was true, it was a unique expression of a brother’s love. But I wanted to hear it from him. But he never said anything in that regard, not even a word, even though I hinted about it over again. He continued to evade the subject. 

The night was progressing. After a drizzle, the air had cleared. The late-night pedestrians were dwindling, as we were facing the imposing features of the opera building and were experiencing the effects of the champaign. In the background we could hear the arrangements of the empty chairs. The whole thing had created the moment when we let go of our guards, our hearts want to empty our inner thoughts  and our lips would lend to confession we would not have dared  to confess otherwise.

But Vahan Yerjanian did not open up. We got up and he accompanied me as we started walking towards the hotel I was staying for it was not far away, saying nothing all the way. I was the one who was carrying on a conversation, until we arrived at the door of the hotel. Up until then he had always spoken with me deferentially, addressing me in plural. There, near the door at Edouard 7, just before he said goodbye to take leave of me, he addressed me in singular and bared it all.

- “You know Zarougian”, he said, “I have always considered little Massis is an unnecessary appendage next to the Great Massis.”

He turned his back on me and walked away.

During the past forty years I have spent numerous nights in Paris but the most memorable remains that night and also the saddest.

Every time I sit at that corner of Café de la Paix, it becomes impossible for me not to remember Vahan Yerjanian with his noble gestures and gentle soul and also Aharon’s imposing height as he descended down the stairs of the metro station.

Vahan Yerjanian, that night, ceased for me being Siamento’s brother but became a man in the full sense of the word. A person who possessed a lofty soul and who did not need to have the association to a famous name to chart his course in life. 

Vahan Yerjanian, the poet who did not write, will continue to live in my soul.

Aharon, the author of magnificent books, that I have difficulty reading now.

Admirable men, both of them.

They were, are no more.

Notes 

1.      Nigol Poghosi Aghbalian (Armenian: Նիկոլ Պողոսի Աղբալեան), 1875, Tiflis – August 15, 1947, Beirut. He was an Armenian scholar, public figure and historian of literature. In 1928, he became one of the founders of Hamazkayin Association and subsequently founded the Hamazkayin Djemaran (Lyceum) in Beirut together with Levon Shant.For the rest of his life Nigol Aghpalian remained a close colleague of Levon Shant. He taught history of Armenian literature and archaic Armenian in Djemaran. 

2.     Hamazasp "Hamo" Ohanjanyan (Armenian: Համօ Օհանջանեան), 1873 Akhalkalak, 1873 – July 31, 1947, Cairo, Egypt. He  was an Armenian medical doctor, revolutionary, and politician of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation. He served as the third Prime Minister of the First Republic of Armenia from May 5 to November 23, 1920.

4.     Aharon Dadourian (in Armenian Ահարոն Տատուրեան), September 19, 1887 -  January 31, 1965. He was known by the pen name Aharon (Ահարոն), born in Ovadjek (near Constantinople, Ottoman Empire) and died in Montmorency, France was an Armenian writer and poet, teacher.

4.     Atom Yarjanian (Armenian: Ատոմ Եարճանեան), better known by his pen name Siamanto (Սիամանթօ), 15 August 1878 – August 1915. He was an influential Armenian writer, poet and national figure and an editor of Hairenik Daily. He was killed by the Ottoman authorities during the Armenian genocide.

5.     Café de la Paix (French pronunciation: ​[kafe də la pɛ]) is a famous café located on the northwest corner of the intersection of the Boulevard des Capucines and the Place de l'Opéra, in the 9th arrondissement of Paris, France.

6.     “Letter to Yerevan”, written in 1944 in response to Soviet Armenian writer Gevorg Abov's «Մենք չենք մոռացել» ("Menk chenk moratsel," "We Have Not Forgotten"), and published the following year, «Թուղթ առ Երեւան» (Tught ar Yerevan, Letter to Yerevan) made Tzarukian a prominent voice in the Armenian Diaspora almost overnight—from the Middle East to Europe and the Americas. The poem was republished more than a dozen times in various Armenian communities—including in Syria, the United States, Lebanon, and Cyprus—up until the early 1990s, and as a result became a source of inspiration for tens of thousands. 

Its translation was published by the 120-year-old Hairenik Press, as the first and only English translation of Tzarukian's “Letter to Yerevan.”

The translation was a collaborative effort between the former director of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF) and First Republic of Armenia Archives and former editor of the Armenian Review Tatul Sonentz-Papazian and former editor of the Armenian Weekly Rupen Janbazian. It features an in-depth introduction by another former editor of the Armenian Weekly and the volume’s English editor, Vahe Habeshian, as well as six original illustrations by Yerevan-based artist Meruzhan Khachatryan.”

 

"But I refuse to be one."

 “They Were, (and) are no more” (Կային, Չկան) is the title of the last chapter of Antranig Zarougian’s “The Greats and the Others” (Մեծերը եւ Միւսները) book where he casts a glimpse of the way Diaspora writers related to each other, as poets, novelists, journalists, and editors and in doing so propelled the post genocide Western Armenian literature to new heights that subsided with their passing away. The attached is my abridged translated segment from that chapter. Vahe H. Apelian

Arshag Chobanian

“ I was with Arshag Chobanian¹ in the Ajemian restaurant. He was playing backgammon with Levon Mozian². Right after seeing me, he said:

- “I will be with you right away.”

And indeed, soon after he got up. He even did not wait long enough for me to sit. Levon Mozian held my arm and said to me:

“My friend, know this. Chobanian lost the past three games, but he let go of the winner instead coming at him with a vengeance to the very end. Something that has never happened before, which makes me believe that you are a very important person for him. I hope you realize that.”

Chobanian pointing his index finger, warned:

“I will see you in the evening, Levon. Revenge….”

We secluded ourselves in a corner. “In a corner” is way of saying because the whole restaurant is the size of a corner. Ajemian, the owner of the restaurant, is another version of Hrair Sassouni. For the second time he reminded me that he is related to Kourken Mahari³, who must be his “khalo.”

Not long after Shavarsh Nartouni⁴ arrived. It was prearranged that we three meet to sort our upcoming trip to Venice to celebrate the 100^th anniversary of “Pazmaveb”⁵ (Բազմավէպ) Three of us were to represent three generations at the celebration.

Having experienced my visa situation and how Hrair Sassouni managed to secure a visa extension for me, I was all too enthused to tell them my story. But it turned out they too had a visa issue because they were not French citizens and lived in the France as Nansen⁶ residents. Consequently, they had not been able to get a visa for visiting Italy. Thoughtlessly the following came out from my mouth.

- “But until now, have you not been able to become French citizens?”

Chobanian frowned at me looking bewildered, and said:

- “ Young man, I have helped many to become French citizens. But I refuse to be one. As long as we maintain our Nansen status, we keep our Armenian identity. By acquiring French citizenship, we become French in France. I was expecting that you would have known this important distinction.”

I was reprimanded.

Arshag Chobanian…

He was an uncompromising idealist who lived in this cynic world with his dreams and with his faith of what is right, safeguarding the unblemished  characteristics of a proud writer. 

When I left the restaurant that day, it was cold and raining but I did not have a trench coat on me. Today, the sun is shining with all its splendor on Paris. But where are Chobanian with his ideals; Nartouni with his advocacies, Levon Mozian and the ever talkative Ajemian who was Kourken Mahari’s relative?

They were, are no more.  

Notes

1.       Arshag Chobanian  (Արշակ Չոպանեան), 1872-1954.  He was born on July 15 in Beşiktaş, Constantinople, Ottoman Empire and passed away on June 8 in Paris. France. He was an Armenian short story writer, journalist, editor, poet, translator, literary critic, playwright, philologist, and a novelist.

2.      Levon Mozian: Armenian writer (1890 - 1958), Writer, Editor, Journalist, Printer, Bookseller, From: Ottoman Empire. Passed away in France.

3.       Kourken Mahari (Ajemian) (August 1, 1903 – June 17, 1969).  Poet and novelist was born in Van. His father, Krikor Ajemian, was an important member of the Armenagan Party (the first Armenian political party, founded in Van in 1885). Mahari became an orphan in 1907, when his father was shot by his brother-in-law, an A.R.F. member, in a confusing incident. In 1915, after the heroic self-defense of Van during the genocide, the future writer migrated to Eastern Armenia with his family. They lost each other on the road of exile, and Mahari lived in orphanages in Dilijan and Yerevan until he found his family again.

        He published his first poems in the press during the first republic, and later, in the Soviet period, he studied at Yerevan State University. He published five collections of poetry and short stories between 1924 and 1931, but his fame in the 1930s was cemented by the first two books of his biographical trilogy, “Childhood” and “Adolescence” (1930). Meanwhile, he had married and had a son. He became a member of the Writers Union of Armenia in 1934.

          The wave of repression unleashed in Armenia after the assassination of Aghasi Khanjian in 1936 reached Mahari too. Trumped-up charges were brought against him and he was condemned to a ten-year exile from 1936-1946 in Siberia. After returning to Yerevan, in 1948 he was condemned, through new trumped-up charges, to life exile. In Siberia, he met Lithuanian student Antonina Povilaitite, who had also been condemned to life exile. They married and lived with the hope of change. Stalin died in 1953, and Mahari and his wife, together with their newly-born daughter, managed to return to Yerevan in 1954. Their daughter would die shortly thereafter, and they would later have a son.

After seventeen years of exile, the writer returned to his homeland in bad health, but with the inner strength to continue his writing. He became one of the leading voices in the literary life of Armenia during the 1950s and 1960s. He published the third part of his trilogy, “On the Eve of Youth” (1956), a volume of poetry in 1959 and a collection of short stories, “The Voice of Silence” (1962), where he reflected the Siberian years.  Another Siberian memoir, “Barbed Wire in Flower,” was first published posthumously in the weekly “Nayiri” of Beirut (1971); it was published in Yerevan only in 1988. He received the title of Emeritus Cultural Activist of Armenia in 1965.

          Mahari published his most important book, the novel “Burning Orchards,” in 1966 (there is a translation in English), an account of Armenian life in Van before World War I, during the self-defense of the city, and afterwards. It created a lively controversy because of some of his views, and he was forced to rewrite it; the second version was published in 1979 in a curtailed form. The final edition was only published in 2004, edited by Grigor Achemyan, Mahari’s eldest son, who has published several unpublished volumes and has prepared an edition of unpublished works in thirteen volumes.

          Kourken Mahari passed away in Palanga (Lithuania), on June 17, 1969, and was buried in Yerevan. (Wikipedia).

4.     Shavarsh Nartouni (Շաւարշ Նարդունի), 1898-1968. His baptismal name was Askanaz Ayvazian. He was born in Armash, Ottoman Empire and passed away in Marseille, France. He was a physician by training but was more involved in literary endeavors. For decades he also edited “Hye Pouj” (Հայ Բուժ – Armenian Medicine), a medical monthly.

5.   “Pazmaveb” (Բազմավէպ)  is an academic journal covering Armenian studies. It is published by the Mechitarist monastery in San Lazzaro degli Armeni, Venice, Italy. According to Robert H. Hewsen, it is the first Armenian scholarly journal. It is the longest-running Armenian publication still being published.

6.    Fridtjof Wedel-Jarlsberg Nansen (10 October 1861 – 13 May 1930) was a Norwegian polymath and Nobel Peace Prize laureate. He gained prominence at various points in his life as an explorer, scientist, diplomat, and humanitarian. He introduced the "Nansen passport" for stateless persons, a certificate that used to be recognized by more than 50 countries.

 

Remembering Manuel Keshishian

Vahe H. Apelian

Manuel Keshishian

Yesterday I read the unexpected passing away of Manuel Keshishian.

I met Manuel and befriended him on the Facebook. He was born and raised in Aleppo and was a lifelong educator in its Armenian schools as a teacher, administrator, and principle; a stage director having studied Studied at Fine and Theatrical Arts State institute in Yerevan/Armenia and produced plays even during the war-torn days. He was also a writer and an activist who depicted the daily struggles the Armenians endured in the city. During the past several years he posted his articles in Civilnet.

I translated a few of his articles. I believe they truly dealt with the daily life in the war-torn Aleppo reflecting the difficulties its residents endured, the heroic deeds they undertook to safeguard the community, the bewilderment and the disappointments they experienced, and the tenacity they exhibited to continue on getting by in the once vibrant  and prosperous Armenian community whose roots in the city extend over centuries. The eminent writer Antranig Zarougian, who also was raised there, labelled it “Dreamlike” having titled one of his books “Yerazayin Haleb-Dramlike Aleppo”.

Manuel Keshishian and the famed Armenian community of Haleb, will remain intimately bound.

Attached are his articles I translated over the years:

Aleppo: We Are Not Well At All (January 17,2020)

http://vhapelian.blogspot.com/2020/01/aleppo-we-are-not-well-at-all.html

Hagop Kalleshian and " Our Boys" in Aleppo (May 16, 2016)

http://vhapelian.blogspot.com/2019/06/hagop-kalleshian-one-of-our-boys-in_2.html

Worrisome Aleppo Armenians (October 29, 2018)

http://vhapelian.blogspot.com/2018/10/worrisome-aleppo-armenians.html

Haleb - We Are Not Well. (November 24, 2019)

http://vhapelian.blogspot.com/2019/11/haleb-we-are-not-well.html

 

 

" Go and Tell Khalo"

 “They Were, (and) are no more” (Կային, Չկան) is the title of the last chapter of Antranig Zarougian’s “The Greats and the Others” (Մեծերը եւ Միւսները) book where he casts a glimpse of the way an intellectual group of writers related to each other, as poets, novelists, journalists, and editors who propelled the post genocide Western Armenian literature to new heights that subsided with their passing away. The attached is an abridged translated segment from that chapter. Vahe H. Apelian

“ After Rue Richer, the next sanctuary was the “Haratch”1 journal. But there was an important matter I needed to settle first. I have no visa. When I presented myself to the French consulate in Aleppo to get a visa, the consul was M. Delbek (Տելպեք). Even though we knew each other, he pretended not to know me and hence offered me a cool reception and asked me dismissively:

- “Why do you want to visit France?”

Just to have said something, I said:

- “To admire the country.”

He responded with a sharp rebuke:

- ‘But sir, you had ample opportunity to admire France in here, but you lost it.”

His remark was obvious. Syria had just gotten rid of the French mandate with a struggle and the Armenians had naturally sided with the local Arabs. I was supposed to humbly put up with his rebuke and accept his remark and move on. My status as an applicant gave me no other room. However, his one remark, his demeanor and his overt scorn turned into a debate.

- “You, Armenians, are an ungrateful people.”

I realized that my ears started buzzing and I started feeling hot and flushed.

- “Are you telling us that we are ungrateful when, it is simply our gratitude towards the Arabs that compelled us to stand against the French whom we valued. Let us face it. Even if all the Armenians sided you, could you have stayed  a day longer?”

I should have stopped here. What I had said could have construed as tolerable. But something else stirred in me and I blurted it out at the cost of endangering my getting a permit to visit France.

- “Mr. Consul, do you remember the events in Cilicia? There too, the Armenian believed in France, but were abandoned. I was four or five years old, but I remember. We were displaced and were in Aintab. An early morning my mother woke me up and told  me while crying – ‘Get up, get up, the French have left last night, the Turks now will rush in.” And holding me by my arm and carrying a bundle of rags under her  other  arm we fled to the Armenian quarter so that the Turks would not slain us. The previous night the French army had left without alerting. Even the Armenian combatants were forbidden to stay put to protect their compatriots. You tell us now that we are ungrateful.”

I was moved and I was left with the impression he too was mellowing down. He fixed his gaze at me for a long time while tapping his desk with his fingers and finally said:

- “Well, well, since you say that you will go to Italy from there, I will issue you a transit visa for France. But admit that you were not in your brightest during the last event.”

It was the first time that I was leaving for overseas and I had no clue what “transit visa” meant. I felt elated and pocketed my stamped passport and left the consulate feeling secure and triumphantly entered Paris. It is after my arrival that I realized the visa the son-of-a-gun Derbetk had issued was only for two days' stay. I had to renew my visa if I wanted to stay longer. 

I am now standing in the hall of a government office in front of a closed door trailing a long line waiting for my turn. They invited the attendants three at a time. Finally, my turn arrived after an intolerable wait. I entered the office  along with two other Lebanese. I was in between the two. The lady who was going to grant us an extension for our visa was a fat lady, around fifty years old, unsmiling, and bitter looking. The first Lebanese received his extension. I extend to her my passport. Seeing the picture of the Syrian eagle on the cover, she flew into a rage.

-“Sir, you do not like us, we do not like you, we are even. So, get out of here.”

I had not realized that there was such a hatred against the Syrians. I was standing still with the passport in my hands. I could not utter a single word. Nothing of the sort I had said to the French Syrian consul, I dared say here. Aleppo was Armenia to me. Here I am like the legendary king Arshag2 on Persian soil. The witch dismissively gestured at me  with her hands to leave and make room for the next applicant, much like she would have, had she been annoyed by a fly.

The Lebanese who was standing behind me hurled a gross insult at her on my behalf. I cannot write the expression here, but it had the  Arabic words that sounded much like a “kiss” and “.....” (sounding a profanity). It was refreshing to hear it. But it would not help me in any way.

It was total fiasco. I was visiting Paris for the very first time and before even visiting the Eiffel tower, I was being kicked out. I felt dejected and depressed and went to Hrair Sassouni’s restaurant in Place d’Alexandrie, next to a large tree. My last hope rested on Arshag Chobanian but I was going to see him the following day and thus offered no immediate solution. I explained my predicament to Hrair.

-“ You do not need to go to anyone else, come tomorrow morning and we go and arrange it for you.”

- “But already two days have passed. Tomorrow means that I have overstayed my visa and that scares me.”

- “Come tomorrow at 9 a.m. and do not think,’ he said carrying  with his French wife to the kitchen a carton container full of vegetables. 

I was wondering whether I should believe him or not when he returned smiling, looked confident, and was very amicable. I was seeing this man for the very first time. From his demeanor and his dress, he appeared to me a street-smart man. I knew that there were some among them who were adroit, enterprising and could get things done. But there were also those who were simply more of a loudmouth than anything else. Which among them was Hrair? I could not dismiss from my mind the dog gampr3 that threw me out. I was envisioning diminutive Hrair in front of that ferocious woman and was sinking more in my despair. But I had no other avenue. I had to wait for tomorrow. I was in a shipwreck.

The next morning, I met him before nine o’clock. We are in the official building. Hrair saluted an official, exchanged joke with another behind a counter. He looked for someone and located him and three of us entered an elevator that took us right in the dog's den. There were a few there. They were all Frenchmen. Among them there was someone who was seating at the edge of a desk with one of his legs touching the floor, the other midair, exchanging pleasantries with that woman. I noticed that she knew how to smile. 

No one was paying attention to us. They hardly took notice of us and continued their pleasantries.  Hrair’s friend, without asking anyone else, took the square visa stamp, and noted fifteen days on my visa and stamped it and we went down. The whole thing did not last more than five minutes. There were no words exchanged with the lady who would have stamped my visa. I am ecstatic. 

When we were in the streets, Hrair posed a moment, and tapped his breast with his palm and with a pompous air, said:

- “Go and tell khalo4 (Garo Sassouni) the kind of status Hrair has attained in Paris.”

But immediately, a bit pensive and almost whispering as if there would be people who would be hearing us, he added:

- “I am joking my dear unger (comrade). It was not a big deal. In the evening they will be showing with three or four friends for dinner and drink a few bottles of wine and that is all to it. Things are done this way here.”

And then, he produced a bundle of cash and gave it to me saying: “When you return to Beirut, give it to our khalo. It’s a gift for the boys. Let him accept it, it's from me.”

Forty years later I am in the Place d’Alexandrie. The big tree is still there. The only things that do not die in France appear to be the trees. 

But where is Hrair, his restaurant and thousands of the other grown-up orphans like him? Where are they?

They were, are no more.

 

Notes

1.       Haratch ('Forward') (Armenian: Յառաջ) was an Armenian daily newspaper based in France. Haratch was founded in 1925 by Schavarch Missakian. The newspaper was famous for attracting high profile names in Armenian literature and journalism.

2.       King Arshag Legend claims that King Arshag spoke forcefully when stepping on the portion of the rug, in the Persian king’s palace, under which it contained soil from Armenia but not when away from it.

3.       Gampr, Gampr (Armenian: գամփռ gamp’ṙ) is an Armenian breed of flock guardian dog native to the Armenian Highlands. 

4.      Khalo, a Kurdish word for uncle, endearingly used.