comment

[arabaliozian]

[I]Since I write mostly about Armenians,
no one seems to be interested in what I have to say –
not even Armenians – especially Armenians
who have been exposed to so many speechifiers
and sermonizers that they tend to mistake me
for one of them.
#

[Shant03]

Re: comment

I always read what you have to write, I hope you continue.

[arabaliozian]

Re: comment

A WASTE OF TIME
****************************************
If I go on writing it’s in the hope that
a miracle may happen and
my voice may reach God’s ear.
But even then…
*
If He exists
He must be tone deaf
if only because he has allowed music
to degenerate to the degree that it has
in our own days.
#
Another if:
If He exists
He must be a fascist because
(one) He was not democratically elected and
(two) He is accountable to none.
Hence the celebrated dictum
that so far no one has dared to contradict:
“Power corrupts and absolute power
corrupts absolutely.”
#

[arabaliozian]

Re: comment

ON HISTORY & IDENTITY
***********************************
Ours is a history of subservience
whose favorite motto is “Yes, sir!”
*
We should teach our children to say:
“I am an Armenian.
I believe nothing I am told.”
*
We are just about the smartest people on earth
but anything that is not one plus one
is higher mathematics to us.
*
History and reality might as well be synonymous.
*
Ours is a history of slaves
who pretend to be masters.
*
Because we don’t understand history
we don’t know who we are.
*
History or reality comes in many shapes and forms:
massacre is only one of them.
*
There are two histories:
the history of masters
and the history of slaves.
*
We have had as many masters
as we have had next-door neighbors.
#

[arabaliozian]

Re: comment

ARMENIANS
************************
“Armenians are ungovernable!”
“Armenians are not yet ready for democracy.”
If our 99% are ungovernable
it may be because our 1%
are morally, politically and intellectually
bankrupt.
*
MIKOYAN SPEAKS
***************************
“Every Soviet citizen should be
a member of the Secret Police.”
That to me is the surest and clearest proof
of moral, political and intellectual bankruptcy.
*
MEMO TO MY GERNTLE READERS
**********************************************
Don’t believe everything I say.
I speak more as a reader and
less as a writer.
If you ever run into a brilliant line by me,
you can be sure of one thing:
the chances are it was stolen.
#

[arabaliozian]

Re: comment

MUMBO JUMBO
******************************
Men are at their most creative
when engaged in creating problems
for themselves.
*
Most men and religious leaders in general
pretend not to know the difference
between belief systems and superstitions
and between ritual and mumbo jumbo.
*
All our problems stem from the fact that
we have consistently refused to admit
we are capable of behaving like idiots.
#

[arabaliozian]

Re: comment

OPTIONS
****************************
If you had a choice between living
in the Homeland and living in Turkey,
which would you choose?
I rephrase the question:
If you had a choice between living in Turkey
and dying in the Homeland…
*
I don’t write to be popular
and the more unpopular I become
the more I am convinced I must be
on the right path.
*
The ambition of all dupes is
to convince himself his ideas are his
and not those of compulsive and habitual liars.
*
In a morally rotten environment
nothing that is good has a chance to survive.
#

[arabaliozian]

Re: comment

AS I SEE IT
**************************
One doest not consent to be brainwashed.
One is born in an environment
where allowing oneself to be brainwashed
is seen as an essential survival tool.
*
To prove that we are a civilized people,
a gentle reader writes:
“We remember, respect, and revere
our martyred writers.”
And I reflect that to be murdered
by a bloodthirsty foreign tyrant
is the best career move
an Armenian writer can make.
*
The roots of our genocide
go back 600 years.
*
The poor don’t pay taxes
but everything they buy is taxed.
Think of their so called “benefits”
as a partial refund by the state.
#

[arabaliozian]

Re: comment

HOMELAND
**************************
For the 1% homeland means
property, prestige and power.
For the 99% anywhere
they are allowed to work
and provide for their families.
*
Speaking for myself:
I have been the luckiest of men
because I have had three of them:
where I was born (Greece),
where I was educated (Italy),
and where I now live (Canada)
and I have never been ordered
to kill and die in defense
of any of them.
#

[arabaliozian]

Re: comment

ON SUCCESS
************************
When asked if he has a chance to succeed as a writer,
I explain that in our environment
success and literature are mutually exclusive concepts
and as an established and experience failure myself
I am not qualified to speak of success.
*
ON THE COMMA
*************************
The comma, I read today, was invented
by a Venetian printer called Aldo Manuzio.
I lived in Venice for five years
and never heard anyone bragging about that fact.
We could build on that.
*
NABOKOV AND DOSTOEVSKY
**************************************
If Dostoevsky had read Nabokov’s assessment
of his CRIME AND PUNISHMENT, my guess is,
he would never have written
THE BROTHERS KARAMAZOFF.
*
MUD
********************
What I think of such nebulous concepts
as homeland and patriotism can be condensed
in three words: “Mud is mud.”
*
OUR GREATEST FAILING
************************************
Allowing our enemies to recreate us
in their own image.
#