We had earnestly implored Mrs. Shnorhik, our cook, so she had prepared for us, outside our customary food, a delicious dish of cheekufta, a row meatball dish delicatessen, and had it placed on the table.
When seating at the table, Shant noticed the reddish colored dish and asked.
- “What is this?”
- “It’s to increase your appetite, Mr. Shant”.
Shant
- “A healthy person has always an increased appetite and does not need to emulate wild beasts!”
***
Whenever we analyzed the roots of a difficult compound word, Shant would immediately tell us to ask Nigol and in this manner he would acknowledge Aghpalian’s authority. Truly, Nigol Aphpalian was an authority in such matters along with his literary critiquing. Father Vartan Hatsouni (Հայր Վարդան Հացունի) a Mkhitarist monk from Venice was a reputable scholar. He always wrote to Aghpalian asking him for articles for the journal – Hantes Amsorya – the Mkhetarian order published. (Hantes Amsorya is an academic journal that publishes research papers and articles on Armenian studies, especially history, art, social sciences, linguistics, and philology. It was established in 1887 by the Mechitarian order in Vienna.)
Aghpalian regularly contributed to the journal without receiving a honorarium and much like a duteous subscriber, regularly sent his subscription fee.
One day he gave me the money to mail to the Vienna. Shant saw it and intruded a little bit furious.
- “Nigol, what kind of a person are you? Is it not enough that you contribute articles without being paid and also feel obligated to pay subscription fee?”
Aghpalian
_ “This is a journal whose only readers are its contributors and if they also do not send subscription fee, the journal will not see the light of day…”
***
One day I asked Aghpalian
- “Why don’t you also write literary reviews much like Hagop Oshagan. In Caucasus you were known as a literary critic.
- “Let me explain to you about my literary critic fame. All in all, I have done one literary review about Avedik Isahagian (Isahakyan) (a prominent Armenian lyric poet). And another about Yeghishe Charents (Nigol Aghpalian is credited to have discovered and nurtured the eminent poet). That is all. It’s like a snowball that rolls down from a mountain top and by the time it reaches the foot of the mountain it becomes a huge ball. That is how my fame as a literary critic has come about.”
He stopped for a brief moment and then said as if he was making a confession.
- “My world in the 5th century writers. I live with them. A little bit also with the Armenian language, words and letters.”
***
It was on the same day that I asked his opinion about Hagop Oshagan’s
“Mnatsortats” (Remnants -Մնացորդաց) that was being published in “Housaper” Daily.
- “Are you following “Mnatsortats” Mr. Aghpalian?”
- “Of course, I read every day.”
- “Have you formulated an opinion?”
- “He is a great talent, but he tires the reader. First his language is hard and does not lend to novel. A novel is the creation of complex characters with simple language.” Nigol elaborated his point citing famous novelists Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Balzac.
We were to come down the stairs as Aghpalian elaborated on his thoughts. He held my arm and said:
- “Listen, a novel has a beginning, a course and an ending. At this moment, say we were writing a novel, our writing is to reach down from this point. Let us start going down. Let us take one step (we did) the novel started its course. But unexpectedly some dust fell upon us. The dust reminded us of desert, and we start talking about desert, the animals that live there, about sandstorms, and so on. But our aim was not that, it was getting down. The course of the novel changed, and we are still on the first stair. Extensive diverging is at the expense of the course’s vigor. People have tamed raging rivers. Oshagan is like a raging river that needs to be dammed.”
A few times I attempted to have Aghpalian talk about Shant’s literature. He always avoided the subject. I concluded that that he was not that enthused about Shant’s literature.
***
A bit before Aghpalian’s death, Shant’s jubilee was celebrated. The main speaker of the event was Aghpalian. Finally, we would have his opinion about Shant’s literature.
The jubilee celebration took place in Beirut’s famed Grand Theatre. But I could not attend it being busy in Aleppo. I wrote to Moushegh to write down Aghpalian’s speech. Moushegh did my request fully and wrote an article summarizing the speech. In spite of the occasion where it becomes understandably permissible to lavish accolades, Aghpalian’s speech lacked the expected enthusiasm and some reservation was palpable. Moushegh’s article was printed as presented. Had it not been Moushegh, I would have been hesitant to have the article printed. But Moushegh’s unreserved love to both Shant and Aghpalin left me no room to doubt.
***
Aghpalian had a cold and had been in bed for the past few days when he had sent a word that he wanted to see me. He had rented a room with an Armenian family and lived there, not far from Jemaran. There were two other persons in the room. I did not know them, but they had a solemn look on their faces as if they were mourners. For a short while I thought that Aghpalian’s condition is so bad that they looked so much concerned. But soon I found out that it was altogether a different matter.
- “You will go to Homs in Syria with these two ungers”, he said to me.
I saw no smile on their bitter faces. On the contrary they seemed to have resigned to their unfortunate luck.
In those days Homs had a sizeable Armenian community and had a church and a school. They had invited Aghpalian a month earlier to be the speaker during the community’ April 24 commemoration. Aghpalian in turn had accepted their invitation but here he was in bed ill and thus could not go. Instead he had recommended “his best student” to take his place.
One of the two was a blonde, almost red haired, and a tall young man. One would have mistaken him for a German. His name was Merdinian. The other was short, a bit heavy set, and was a trustee of the Homs Armenian school. The poor souls looked much like invitees to what they thought would be a lavish meal and now are being offered a suspicious looking soup.
But they had no choice. Maybe they thought it’s better to accept what is being offered to them instead of remaining hungry. The car was waiting outside with a driver who is soldier in the French army and is Assyrian in origin. On our way I understood that the commander was out of the city and the car was under the soldier’s disposition which he has put in good use to transport a great Armenian. Surely, the soldier was also disappointed seeing a young man instead of the great man.
After he bid the guests goodbye, Aghpalian had me stay with him and he advised me.
- “Don’t be shy and embarrassed. Arrange your thoughts and deliver them without hurry. Do not become emotional. Consider that you are not on the stage but in the classroom and in the presence of your classmates you are delivering your lesson. Toumanian used to speak from the stage as if he was talking to villagers. Speak in a plain language so that you will be understood. Your audience is not made of intellectuals, they are ordinary folks. There is no need to use elegant words. There was a time when there was a fierce competition to be known as an orator. That was before the genocide. It’s a different state now. Those who will listen you are much like you. They are survivors of the genocide. You have nothing else to say other than remind them the days of the life they lived. It is important that you do not become emotional. On your return you will tell me how did your fiery baptismal went.”
Everything would have been fine had it not been for the kahana (married priest) who was to preside over the ceremony. Mr. Voskerithcian, whom we all knew, had become Der Mashdoz kahana and served the Homs community. The hall was small but was full to capacity. On top of the stage I read Avedis Aharonian famous quote. I had decided to recite that passage in closing my speech to impress my audience but it’s there now and my reciting it would not have impressed anyone. I decided to quote another passage, but I was not sure who the author was. No problem, I thought, I will say “here, the great poet’s message” and cite the passage.
A boy older than me recited Yeghishe Charents’ “Yes Im Anoush Hayastani” poem. In those days no joyful or sad event would be held without reciting that poem. A girl sang “Tou Lats Me Lenir, Yes Shad Em Latser” song. And finally, Der Mashdots came on stage and began thus.
- “Now you will hear a young man who has been my student”.
I was taken back. It’s something to be Nigol Aghpalian’s student and it’s altogether something else to have been the student of a married priest. I wished it would have ended with that, there and then. He kept on talking about me at length; that I have been an intelligent and a good student, and that I wrote poems and articles in newspapers, and that he, Der Moushegh, had predicted all that etc. etc. While what he told was true, but it was altogether different than what he said. To begin with, he had not taught me in a class. He was the superintendent of the Haigazian School and carried a whistle in his hand and was in charge of our class comprised of students raging from ten years old to twenty years old; an amalgam of students filling the classroom, sort of a repository of “superfluous articles”. The person responsible for this class was Mr. Voskeritchian. He also had a black stick, and in the drawer of the teacher’s desk he kept a cloth brush, a comb, a mirror and a jar of water in the corner. Should he slapped anyone, which happened often, the victim needed to bring water and pour on his hands to have him wash his hands. His black stick, with a silvery handle had been broken upon my back. It was not he who caned me, it was Mr. Mazloumian and Mr. Voskeritchian had sent me home to bring a Medjidiye to make up for the broken stick. A good student I was not, especially that year I had fled the school for a whole month along with other mischiefs….
After speaking for a quarter of an hour, he finally invited “his student” to the podium. I came on the podium as if I just woke up from a dream. I do not remember what I said because I am not there, I was in the third grade of Haigazian school…..
I do not remember what I said. I know that the audience applauded once and the presiding kahana Der Mousheg intervened letting the audience know that in a solemn occasion such as this one, the audience should not clap. But as I was coming down the stage, he took upon himself to applaud.
I spent the night there. In the morning they escorted me to the bus departing to Beirut. I put the ten pounds Mr. Merdinian gave in my pocket and carried a large box of sweets to Mr. Aghpalian.
On Tuesday morning, Mr. Aghpalian, having recuperated, came to school. But the opportunity to talk to him did not come about. The following day he asked me.
- “Eh, tell me, how did your expedition to Homs go?”
- “I do not know, Mr. Aghpalian.”
- “How is that you do not know. Were you not the speaker?”
- “Don’t you think that question should be asked to the listeners?”
- “You are wrong. Should you have come down the stage content with yourself, it would mean that it was a successful and that the listeners were content. In such matters the judge is always the person, yourself, and no other….”
We talked at length in the school yard. He added.
- “I’s not only to the oratory I am referring to. It is true in general for all the arts, especially in literature. If you wrote something and if you liked what you wrote, that means its good, publish it. If you are not all content, then tear it and toss it away.”
And because he would not end without a witty remark, he added.
- “It seems to me that for now, you have more tossing to do, than publishing.”
He was right. During the past fifty years, more of my writings in journals are for tossing than those I published in books. But that does not mean all my books are equally meritable.
My consolation is that, those printed in journals remain in the journals and are forgotten and hence they are less of a concern to be ashamed of. In literature, the press is much like the obituary of the unknown soldier. Respectfully we bow to their memory without having known who they actually were.
***
During our first year in Jemaran, the dormitory was in a separate building. Aghpalian used to come there and would tell us
- “Join me, let us walk, otherwise you will get overweight like me.”
And soon after,
- “When I was young, I was a slender man and the girls would look at me favorably.”
And as a group we used to go on a promenade along the shore, in Ein El Mreish. People would be sitting on chairs in front of the building along the narrow streets. Aghpalian would be leading while talking to Moushegh and I on both sides of him. The rest, younger than us, would be following us.
A man smoking hookah, suddenly stood up in reverence at the sight of this with a goatee who had so many children who were all boys. He shouted:
- “Mashallah, mashallah!”
I explained to Aghpalian what the man meant. He smiled;
- “Why not?. Had I been in the fatherland, I might have had more children. After all, I have not been a fruitless tree.” (He had left behind in Soviet Armenia a daughter and two sons.)
***
Between this “unlikely twins”, Shant is stiff, self-contained, and aloof, while Aghpalian is communicative, conciliatory, almost humble. One would be left with the impression that it would be difficult to be understood by the first and the latter would be more prone to yield. The truth of the matter is that it was not necessarily so, but to the contrary. Shant looked stiff but upon hearing a logical suggestion, even though it would be against his viewpoint, he would take the suggestion into consideration and agree. During the classroom discussion he would take into consideration and would say, “yes, my son, you have a point, I will make a note of it” and taking a small notebook from his pocket would make a note.
Aghpalian, on the outside looked pliant, but deep down he was obstinate and insistent. Speaking about Bedros Tourian, he gave his biographical information and then said.
- “He was a clever student, but he did poorly in his studies as usually poets are poor in attention span and wandering”.
After the class I brought to his attention that it was not the case. That he was a good and did well in his studies. I gave him the name of the book where I had read it. I also gave him an example cited in the book. He listened to me and moved on. During my midterm examination I wrote the same. He had marked it with a red pen and noted on the margin “wrong”, although he knew about it because I had given him the book that substantiated it.
