Black Dog of Fate

I'd planned to spend at least a few hours reading Balakian yesterday, hoping to work ahead and, perhaps, give myself time to revel in the book rather than rush to finish it. I spent the entire snow day in my chair with Black Dog of Fate. And I wish I was still there. By the time 7pm rolled around, I'd been reading for 8 hours. I was entranced.

Balakian's memoir accomplishes so many aspects of writing, research, and searching that I, too, long to achieve in my work. Which made the reading--which would have been moving regardless of my particularly strong connection to the work--even more inspiring.

Where to begin?

1. Balakian's ability to trace how the idea of Armenia exists in his mind in childhood, and how that idea changed over time as he learned more and more of his history. At first, Armenia seems to mean nothing more than his grandmother: "Since there was no picture of the old country in our house and since I didn't have one etched in my mind, the old country came to mean my grandmother. Whatever it was, she was. Whatever she was, it was" (17).

But as he uncovers, slowly, and often unintentionally, the history of the Armenian Genocide, that concept changes, Armenia becoming less an idea and more an explanation of his family's behavior, and eventually all of what the latter half of the book tackles.

2. Photographs, images, artifacts, and how he uses them to write about aspects of his family's stories that he might not know for certain. The way he introduces those artifacts and then writes, "I imagine my grandfather," or "I think of my Aunt Anna," or "I wonder if my grandmother..." It's something I've found myself doing in my own work (Lately I've been writing passages that start like "It's 1933 and my grandfather sews zippers on men’s pants in New York City's Garment District"), and witnessing Balakian make similar moves in, of course, much more sophisticated, intricate, and effective ways allowed me to feel more confident in my projects and also inspired me to write about and research my family in an even more sophisticated (hopefully) way.

3. A similar thing happened when Balakian writes about his time in the Middle East, specifically Aleppo and Damascus. Between his descriptions of place, the way he describes feeling past and present history colliding at once, and the way he maneuvers through the current political turmoil and his family's past--I was stopped in my tracks. So many descriptions so alike those I've been trying to write of those similar places. So much connection to his tone, style. The draw to images and people and place. Can you tell I'm still in awe of Balakian's prose?

4. I'll let this be the last thing I point out. A few lines that I keep returning to:
     "In denying the crime of genocide and blaming the victim, the perpetrator culture continues to create a false reality through which it attempts to rehabilitate itself" (290).

     "What then, if you are Armenian? True forgiveness can be granted only after the perpetrator has sought and earned it through confession, repentance, and restitution. If the perpetrator government stalks the victims in an effort to prevent the victims' acts of commemoration, there can be no full healing. The victim is held hostage in a wilderness of grief and rage, and is shut out of its moral place in history" (291).

 And I'll let Balakian end this post with a discussion of memory, history, and the uncovering of the past. I'm still savoring this:

     "The past is ruptured, but one excavates the shards, brushes them off, handles them, finds a way to see the broken picture, to navigate the lacunae between a solid image that leads to another solid image. And the solid images begin to add up. Images of the place then and now. Words, the texture of paper, the hand that wrote the words on the paper. The sensory densities becoming parts of a memory" (331).