What do you think?
Rate this book
Libro senza nome
Questo romanzo mette in scena un incontro tra Shushanik Kurghinian e Zabel Yesayan, due pioniere della letteratura del Novecento, e due straordinarie femministe, la cui eredità è stata prima dissipata e poi dimenticata dalla storia armena. L'intelligenza, l'intuito e la capacità di anticipare gli eventi le resero del tutto estranee alla propria epoca, relegandole a un ruolo marginale. Sono vite postume, che provano a iniziare quando la morte ha già preso il sopravvento. Lo scambio tra le due grandi intellettuali è intervallato, in chiave metaletteraria, da una serie di conversazioni tra l'autrice di questo romanzo e una sua amica, Lara, che proprio su Kurghinian e Yesayan stanno effettuando un lungo lavoro di ricerca.
160 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2006
5 people are currently reading
484 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews
January 2, 2025
“Scrivere, per vivere. Per vivere, scrivere.”
February 12, 2025
Winner of the Society of Authors R
TA First Translation Prize, awarded to Deanna Cachoian-Schanz and editor Tatiana Ryckman
It’s hard to get used to something new, but it’s necessary to try.
A Book, Untitled was the December 2023 Republic of Consciousness Book of the Month and another absolutely intriguing selection from a book club that highlights and supports innovative literature from the UK's small press scene, this time from Tilted Axis Press. Their mission, highly pertinent to this novel is:
A Book, Untitled is Deanna Cachoian-Schanz’s translation from Armenian of a book by Shushan Avagyan, originally published in samizdat form.
The novel is based around an imagined conversation between two Armenian women writers - from the translator's afterword: The first encounter in the novel is between Shushanik Kurghinian—the socialist poet who fled the Tsar's regime to return to a Soviet Armenian republic—and the Western Armenian, Constantinople-born writer Zabel Yesayan—who had fled her own annihilation as the Ottoman Empire fell and the borders of the modern Turkish Republic were drawn. The two writers are not known to have met, but were both in Yerevan in 1926.
This is interspersed with another meeting, some 75 years later, between the typist/writer (an authorial stand in) and the writer Lara Aharonian. Shushan Avagyan was translating the poems of Shushanik Kurghinian from Armenian into English (indeed this novel was originally to be her translator's notes), and Lara Aharonian writing a biography of Zabel Yesayan when the two met.
And the story is told in very fragmentary fashion, the two time lines blurred and interspersed with poetry (often unattributed), an imagined transcript of Yesayan's interrogation when she was arrested in 1937 in a Stalinist purge (which was to cost her her freedom and ultimately her life), extracts from books etc.
One of those interrogations, with a interrogator who is fond of quoting Virginia Woolf and analyse Charlotte Bronte, sets out a credo similar to that of the novel to justify it's non-traditional form:
First Interrogator: The traditional narrative form has its particular advantages.
It doesn’t require any particular effort on the part of the reader or audience, just like Hollywood films.
Such a linear stream of thought serves only one purpose; to ease the process of perception
…
Unnatural and estranged syntax slows the process of our perception and forces us to analyse each concept in a new way.
And this is taken from (per the translator) an imagined conversation between Zabel Yesayan and the “interrogators” of the Soviet regime who imprisoned her during the Great Purge [in 1937] [..which] begins to blur the boundaries between’ historic and literary canons, and their censorship by the hegemonic structures of power to which they were subjected. To this end the Soviet interrogators are given hypothetical names, which happen to be, instead of Soviet officials, Armenian literary figures. (here Nshan Beshiktashlian)
The 130 translated pages of the novel come in English with, from the translator, a 5 page foreword introducing the historical protagonists, 30 pages of translator’s afterword explaining her translation choices (often actively discussed with the author) and a 10 page chapter guide (which is in effective lieu of intrusive footnotes). But those additions should be regarded as an integral part of the novel itself in English, which might be seen best as a colloborative work between Cachoian-Schanz and Avagyan, rather than a translation. One of those chapter notes will give a flavour:
Chapter 1.5, ".Letter to Violet," is written in two tenses. In the present tense, the narrator reflects on her time waiting in the airport with her friend Tina as they discuss their previous days in Cape Cod, The past tense narrates the days prior, spent editing a translation manuscript of Shushanik Kurghinian's poetry with a group of women. This chapter begins A Book, Untitled's ongoing commentary on translation and starts to present lines from the archival material being discovered by the typist/writer and Lara. Various lines of Kurghinian's Poetry are dispersed throughout the chapter. Some are quoted, others not and the narrator uses them both to envision her own alternative society, as well as begin the biographical story of Kurghinian's failed marriage. This chapter refers to the Armenian region of Zangezur; Lev Nikolaevich, or Tolstoy; contemporary artist Tina Bastajian (b. 1962) and contemporary writer Violet Grigoryan (b. 1962) one of the founders and editors of the Armenian literary journal Inknagir.
Translation is also integral to much of the commentary in the novel:
You know, Lara, a translation, like algebra, requires one to find the precise formula of the relative values; the sole formula.
For example: there is x word or phrase in the sentence to, which you must give a value or explanation so that the translating sentence can balance the translated sentence.
The simplest thing is also the most bizarre thing, and the most bizarre thing is also the most wonderful thing, which has to be examined.
That most simple x word is the key to the sentence that will open that foreign door to that foreign room where, locked away, they keep the foreign books about foreign cultures written by the hands of foreign geniuses.
and Cachoian-Schanz does unlock for us three "foreign geniuses", the present-day author and the two early 20th century writers.
And as for the novel's title ... well that's up to the reader:
The difference between biography and autobiography is than the first one is finished and the second one is still being written; its course can change at any moment.
So it's plausible that the book's title could be "Auto/ Biographies."
ZY: In Bolis they were also pushing me to teach, Armenian literature. But I had other plans.
The wind carries in the new scent of lilacs that mixes with the strong smell of dust after the rain.
SK: They talk to [omitted text] and they make confident statements about how I'm obviously not and will never be a poet.
But you ask: Who's the main hero? What's her name?
Where does the action take place?
Will there be an end to all this? A happy ending . . .
What's the book's title: "My Soul in Exile" or "To Live"?
Decide for yourselves.
There were parts - for example where Woolf, with whom I'm familiar, was quoted - that I fully appreciated and which made me realise how much I might be missing in other parts where, at the end of a chapter, I needed the guide to explain to me what I had read. But that's part of the novel's process. To borrow from the First Interrogator, this is not a conventional Hollywood-film like read, but one that requires effort which slows the process of perception and forces the reader to think and question their understanding.
4 stars.
TA First Translation Prize, awarded to Deanna Cachoian-Schanz and editor Tatiana Ryckman
It’s hard to get used to something new, but it’s necessary to try.
A Book, Untitled was the December 2023 Republic of Consciousness Book of the Month and another absolutely intriguing selection from a book club that highlights and supports innovative literature from the UK's small press scene, this time from Tilted Axis Press. Their mission, highly pertinent to this novel is:
An ongoing exploration into alternatives – to the hierarchisation of certain languages and forms, including forms of translation; to the monoculture of globalisation; to cultural, narrative, and visual stereotypes; to the commercialisation and celebrification of literature and literary translation.
A Book, Untitled is Deanna Cachoian-Schanz’s translation from Armenian of a book by Shushan Avagyan, originally published in samizdat form.
The novel is based around an imagined conversation between two Armenian women writers - from the translator's afterword: The first encounter in the novel is between Shushanik Kurghinian—the socialist poet who fled the Tsar's regime to return to a Soviet Armenian republic—and the Western Armenian, Constantinople-born writer Zabel Yesayan—who had fled her own annihilation as the Ottoman Empire fell and the borders of the modern Turkish Republic were drawn. The two writers are not known to have met, but were both in Yerevan in 1926.
This is interspersed with another meeting, some 75 years later, between the typist/writer (an authorial stand in) and the writer Lara Aharonian. Shushan Avagyan was translating the poems of Shushanik Kurghinian from Armenian into English (indeed this novel was originally to be her translator's notes), and Lara Aharonian writing a biography of Zabel Yesayan when the two met.
And the story is told in very fragmentary fashion, the two time lines blurred and interspersed with poetry (often unattributed), an imagined transcript of Yesayan's interrogation when she was arrested in 1937 in a Stalinist purge (which was to cost her her freedom and ultimately her life), extracts from books etc.
One of those interrogations, with a interrogator who is fond of quoting Virginia Woolf and analyse Charlotte Bronte, sets out a credo similar to that of the novel to justify it's non-traditional form:
First Interrogator: The traditional narrative form has its particular advantages.
It doesn’t require any particular effort on the part of the reader or audience, just like Hollywood films.
Such a linear stream of thought serves only one purpose; to ease the process of perception
…
Unnatural and estranged syntax slows the process of our perception and forces us to analyse each concept in a new way.
And this is taken from (per the translator) an imagined conversation between Zabel Yesayan and the “interrogators” of the Soviet regime who imprisoned her during the Great Purge [in 1937] [..which] begins to blur the boundaries between’ historic and literary canons, and their censorship by the hegemonic structures of power to which they were subjected. To this end the Soviet interrogators are given hypothetical names, which happen to be, instead of Soviet officials, Armenian literary figures. (here Nshan Beshiktashlian)
The 130 translated pages of the novel come in English with, from the translator, a 5 page foreword introducing the historical protagonists, 30 pages of translator’s afterword explaining her translation choices (often actively discussed with the author) and a 10 page chapter guide (which is in effective lieu of intrusive footnotes). But those additions should be regarded as an integral part of the novel itself in English, which might be seen best as a colloborative work between Cachoian-Schanz and Avagyan, rather than a translation. One of those chapter notes will give a flavour:
Chapter 1.5, ".Letter to Violet," is written in two tenses. In the present tense, the narrator reflects on her time waiting in the airport with her friend Tina as they discuss their previous days in Cape Cod, The past tense narrates the days prior, spent editing a translation manuscript of Shushanik Kurghinian's poetry with a group of women. This chapter begins A Book, Untitled's ongoing commentary on translation and starts to present lines from the archival material being discovered by the typist/writer and Lara. Various lines of Kurghinian's Poetry are dispersed throughout the chapter. Some are quoted, others not and the narrator uses them both to envision her own alternative society, as well as begin the biographical story of Kurghinian's failed marriage. This chapter refers to the Armenian region of Zangezur; Lev Nikolaevich, or Tolstoy; contemporary artist Tina Bastajian (b. 1962) and contemporary writer Violet Grigoryan (b. 1962) one of the founders and editors of the Armenian literary journal Inknagir.
Translation is also integral to much of the commentary in the novel:
You know, Lara, a translation, like algebra, requires one to find the precise formula of the relative values; the sole formula.
For example: there is x word or phrase in the sentence to, which you must give a value or explanation so that the translating sentence can balance the translated sentence.
The simplest thing is also the most bizarre thing, and the most bizarre thing is also the most wonderful thing, which has to be examined.
That most simple x word is the key to the sentence that will open that foreign door to that foreign room where, locked away, they keep the foreign books about foreign cultures written by the hands of foreign geniuses.
and Cachoian-Schanz does unlock for us three "foreign geniuses", the present-day author and the two early 20th century writers.
And as for the novel's title ... well that's up to the reader:
The difference between biography and autobiography is than the first one is finished and the second one is still being written; its course can change at any moment.
So it's plausible that the book's title could be "Auto/ Biographies."
ZY: In Bolis they were also pushing me to teach, Armenian literature. But I had other plans.
The wind carries in the new scent of lilacs that mixes with the strong smell of dust after the rain.
SK: They talk to [omitted text] and they make confident statements about how I'm obviously not and will never be a poet.
But you ask: Who's the main hero? What's her name?
Where does the action take place?
Will there be an end to all this? A happy ending . . .
What's the book's title: "My Soul in Exile" or "To Live"?
Decide for yourselves.
There were parts - for example where Woolf, with whom I'm familiar, was quoted - that I fully appreciated and which made me realise how much I might be missing in other parts where, at the end of a chapter, I needed the guide to explain to me what I had read. But that's part of the novel's process. To borrow from the First Interrogator, this is not a conventional Hollywood-film like read, but one that requires effort which slows the process of perception and forces the reader to think and question their understanding.
4 stars.
March 3, 2024
It’s a bit difficult to describe A Book, Untitled as it encapsulates a lot of things within it’s brief 145 pages (then there’s the translator’s afterword which takes up another part of the book) There’s autobiography, autofiction, historical fiction, part research. poetry and feminist lit. It’s a lot to handle but it is executed excellently.
The book is about poet Shusanik Kurghinian and author Zabel Yesayan, two feminist writers who lived roughly at the same time although they never met, Shushan Avagyan reimagines them having a conversation with each other. Both authors were censored in Armenia, for both being women and writing radical work. As the conversation develops we see Shushan Avagyan also reveal her problems as an censored author as A Book, Untitled was published in samizdat form.
In between this struggle with censorship Avagyan also inserts, within the text Kurghinian’s poems. In the meantime, the author also meets Lara Aharonian, who is writing a biography about Yesayan thus giving a meta aspect in the book. Add that to offside comments about the structure of the novel, with particular reference to Virginia Woolf and one has quite a novel to pick apart.
The translator’s afterword is essential to understanding the text, which also means that the act of translating is also crucial to the novel. Obviously translation is always important but here it’s how the process of bringing out the many subtleties of A Book, Untitled , happened as Deanna Cachoian-Schanz gives a lot of historical context to the subjects Shushan Avagyan is researching.
A Multi-layered, complex novel but also original in both execution and structure. This was my first book of my Republic of Consciousness subscription and I am looking forward to what I will be offered in the next few months.
The book is about poet Shusanik Kurghinian and author Zabel Yesayan, two feminist writers who lived roughly at the same time although they never met, Shushan Avagyan reimagines them having a conversation with each other. Both authors were censored in Armenia, for both being women and writing radical work. As the conversation develops we see Shushan Avagyan also reveal her problems as an censored author as A Book, Untitled was published in samizdat form.
In between this struggle with censorship Avagyan also inserts, within the text Kurghinian’s poems. In the meantime, the author also meets Lara Aharonian, who is writing a biography about Yesayan thus giving a meta aspect in the book. Add that to offside comments about the structure of the novel, with particular reference to Virginia Woolf and one has quite a novel to pick apart.
The translator’s afterword is essential to understanding the text, which also means that the act of translating is also crucial to the novel. Obviously translation is always important but here it’s how the process of bringing out the many subtleties of A Book, Untitled , happened as Deanna Cachoian-Schanz gives a lot of historical context to the subjects Shushan Avagyan is researching.
A Multi-layered, complex novel but also original in both execution and structure. This was my first book of my Republic of Consciousness subscription and I am looking forward to what I will be offered in the next few months.
April 5, 2024
Video review to follow
March 18, 2025
“Libro senza nome” di Shushan Avagyan è stata per me un’esperienza di lettura frustrante e, in larga parte, incomprensibile. Il libro si propone come un dialogo tra due autrici armene, ma questa conversazione risulta poco chiara e quasi inesistente. La narrazione si sviluppa in una forma poetica che, anziché coinvolgere, rende difficile distinguere chi parla e quale sia il filo conduttore del discorso.
Nonostante il tema affascinante – un’indagine sul femminismo nella cultura armena – il testo si è rivelato per me poco accessibile, al punto da farmi abbandonare la lettura. Le parole sembrano svuotate di significato, lasciandomi con la sensazione di leggere qualcosa di ermetico e impenetrabile. Un vero peccato, perché l’argomento meritava un’esplorazione più chiara e coinvolgente.
Nonostante il tema affascinante – un’indagine sul femminismo nella cultura armena – il testo si è rivelato per me poco accessibile, al punto da farmi abbandonare la lettura. Le parole sembrano svuotate di significato, lasciandomi con la sensazione di leggere qualcosa di ermetico e impenetrabile. Un vero peccato, perché l’argomento meritava un’esplorazione più chiara e coinvolgente.
June 8, 2023
I love the ambition of this. I feel like I've read a million books in the past year that didn't have the courage to go all out with the disparate, discordant style that dominates contemporary lit, right now
March 31, 2025
Shushan Avagyan’s “Girq-anvernagir” (A Book, Untitled) is a literary bridge between generations of Armenian feminists. The book starts with an end. The typist, Avagyan, is told not to write to her lover anymore (Avagyan, 2006, p. 11). It’s Spring, Zapel Yesayan is in prison. She asked for ‘embroidery thread’ according to her daughter Sophie (Avagyan, 2006, p. 11). The embroidery thread Yesayan lacked in the prison was the very link between generations of women who resisted patriarchy, which would have been a great support to her in those harsh circumstances.
Lara and Shushan are at a cafe on Abovyan Street, perhaps on the two chairs depicted on the book’s cover, that the English version’ translator Deanna Cachoian-Schanz precisely describes as “two black, empty, cast-iron chairs seated on opposite sides of a matching black table” (Avagyan, 2023, p. vii). The idea of the Girq is born out of loss–like the loss of the typist’s lover at the beginning–to provoke by Avagyan’s text a ‘re-remembering’ process.
Read the full review here: https://arminellik.medium.com/a-revie...
Lara and Shushan are at a cafe on Abovyan Street, perhaps on the two chairs depicted on the book’s cover, that the English version’ translator Deanna Cachoian-Schanz precisely describes as “two black, empty, cast-iron chairs seated on opposite sides of a matching black table” (Avagyan, 2023, p. vii). The idea of the Girq is born out of loss–like the loss of the typist’s lover at the beginning–to provoke by Avagyan’s text a ‘re-remembering’ process.
Read the full review here: https://arminellik.medium.com/a-revie...
October 16, 2025
4.5 stars
"Someone will remember the disappeared, and while remembering, will write verses dedicated to them, and while reading those verses, yet another will re-remember them."
This was a brilliant and thought-provoking novel of autotheory/autofiction. On the surface, Avagyan is exploring a hypothetical meeting of two revolutionary and feminist early 20th century Armenian women writers (Shushanik Khurginian and Zabel Yesayan) during the one year they overlapped in a specific city. After which, one fell ill and died and the author was killed by the Stalin regime in Soviet Armenia.
But in describing this hypothetical scenario, Avagyan takes the opportunity to explore, critique, and challenge the reader to consider how censorship, translation, and writing itself plays a role in society, culture, politics and power in a heteropatriarchal capitalist hegemony.
The novel's text is interspersed with Khurginian's poetry and Yesayan's letters, oftentimes unquoted and uncited, also mixing in many Armenian and Soviet references, the author's own works, and an unnamed narrator's postcards to an unknown recipient. Hypothetical scenes of Yesayan's interrogations about her work and her family while imprisoned are also sprinkled through the pages, oftentimes mutating into reflections on art and censorship. It's dizzying in its complexity and yet once you're in the rhythm, easy to follow. (The chapter guides summarizing key references helped too).
I found the translator's afterword, which went in depth into literary criticism and reflections on the act of translating, the most rewarding after reading the novel. It brought together many ideas and reflections I had of my own, such as the mirroring of the real meeting of Avagyan and her colleague/friend, Lara, to search through the censored/uncensored archives of these two women, with the hypothetical meeting of Khurginian and Yesayan, and the necessity almost of maintaining the 'strangeness' of the original text in its references, meter/style, etc. in order to emphasize the context of the novel and the privilege of accessing stories in another language.
There's so much I could say about this experience but a lot of it is summed up so well by the translator, Deanna Cachoian-Schanz, so I'll just encourage anyone interested in this English translation of "A Book, Untitled" to ensure they read that afterword.
"Which is worse: To let the living words of the poet die in damp boxes in dark, treacherous rooms or to sow them like seeds, mixed with another's words, to revive them and let them bloom in untitled fields? / Besides, quotation marks privatize words and make them someone else's property. / The words belong neither to the typist/writer nor to you, reader. / They simply unite our past, present and future." (page 124)
"Someone will remember the disappeared, and while remembering, will write verses dedicated to them, and while reading those verses, yet another will re-remember them."
This was a brilliant and thought-provoking novel of autotheory/autofiction. On the surface, Avagyan is exploring a hypothetical meeting of two revolutionary and feminist early 20th century Armenian women writers (Shushanik Khurginian and Zabel Yesayan) during the one year they overlapped in a specific city. After which, one fell ill and died and the author was killed by the Stalin regime in Soviet Armenia.
But in describing this hypothetical scenario, Avagyan takes the opportunity to explore, critique, and challenge the reader to consider how censorship, translation, and writing itself plays a role in society, culture, politics and power in a heteropatriarchal capitalist hegemony.
The novel's text is interspersed with Khurginian's poetry and Yesayan's letters, oftentimes unquoted and uncited, also mixing in many Armenian and Soviet references, the author's own works, and an unnamed narrator's postcards to an unknown recipient. Hypothetical scenes of Yesayan's interrogations about her work and her family while imprisoned are also sprinkled through the pages, oftentimes mutating into reflections on art and censorship. It's dizzying in its complexity and yet once you're in the rhythm, easy to follow. (The chapter guides summarizing key references helped too).
I found the translator's afterword, which went in depth into literary criticism and reflections on the act of translating, the most rewarding after reading the novel. It brought together many ideas and reflections I had of my own, such as the mirroring of the real meeting of Avagyan and her colleague/friend, Lara, to search through the censored/uncensored archives of these two women, with the hypothetical meeting of Khurginian and Yesayan, and the necessity almost of maintaining the 'strangeness' of the original text in its references, meter/style, etc. in order to emphasize the context of the novel and the privilege of accessing stories in another language.
There's so much I could say about this experience but a lot of it is summed up so well by the translator, Deanna Cachoian-Schanz, so I'll just encourage anyone interested in this English translation of "A Book, Untitled" to ensure they read that afterword.
"Which is worse: To let the living words of the poet die in damp boxes in dark, treacherous rooms or to sow them like seeds, mixed with another's words, to revive them and let them bloom in untitled fields? / Besides, quotation marks privatize words and make them someone else's property. / The words belong neither to the typist/writer nor to you, reader. / They simply unite our past, present and future." (page 124)
July 28, 2024
"If there were more appreciation for translational work and a little bit more of attention were paid to translation, the world wouldn't be this isolated. Yes, knowing only one language limits a person."
December 25, 2024
Progetto interessante ma lettura per me troppo impegnativa, seppure il volume sia molto breve. Purtroppo ho scoperto solo dopo metá libro le utilissime note di lettura dei capitoli che sono state messe alla fine, avrebbero aiutato dall’inizio a capire di più sui riferimenti e su chi sta parlando.
December 8, 2025
քեզ / կուղարկեմ
երեկ շարժապատկերներ դաջեցի,
ու մի տեքստ եկավ մտքիս։
քեզ կուղարկեմ։
բացիկը հինգ օր շարունակ 1-5 օր է ցույց տալիս,
եւ ես (դրանից) կազմաքնադվում եմ։
ուղարկել մի բան եւ չիմանալ՝.։
կհասնի, թե՞ չէ։
երբ
ինձ
ուղարկեցի
հասա։
հիմա հետ եմ եկել,
ու չգիտեմ, թե ուր
եմ։
քաոտիկ ժամանակներ են։
քաոտիկ բառը նույնքան փոշոտ է,
որքան վատ լինելու, չլինելու սահմանները։
պարզ չի, թե ինչի եւ ում համար տեղ կա
այս քաղաքում։
պարզ չի՝ ուր գնալ,
երբ ինձ համար չկա։
պարզ չի,
թե
որտեղ
կա։
տեղ։
ինչ որ մի օր ես կուտեմ երեւանի բոլոր pain au chocolat-ները։
ֆրանսերենը սովորում եմ էնպես, ոնց հինգ-վեց տարեկանում հայերենն էի սովորում։
ուզում եմ կարողանալ
ինչ որ մեկին
սիրել
այնպես,
ոնց շուշան ավագյանի տեքստերն եմ
սիրում,
եւ
նույնքան սիրով ու ըմբոստությամբ հարաբերվել մարդկանց հետ,
որքան՝ պատկերի ու տեքստի։
մի տարի առաջ
գրել եմ
«շատ գեղեցիկ են Ձեր կոլաժները»
մեկնաբանությունը։
դու դրանից առաջ էիր շոյել իմ լուսանկարները,
բայց ես այդ չէի հիշում։
երբեք չեմ մոռանում
«արվեստն է մեզ միավորել, թռչնակ»
արտահայտությունը,
եւ որ ընկերությունն ամենակարեւոր հարաբերությունն է ինձ համար։
երբեք չեմ մոռանում։
pain au chocolat
կապակցության մեջ ցավ կա,
երբ երեք լեզու գիտես եւ սովորում ես չորրորդը։
մի օր ես կհասնեմ փարիզի նուպար գրադարան
ու կփորձեմ արխիվային թղթերի վրա խոնավ հետքեր չթողնել։
այլեւս հաշտ եմ ուրիշների գանգուր մազերի հետ։
գիրք-անվերնագիր։
գիրք-հարցադրում։
квир, это мариам.
տարօրինակ(ելով) երեւանը։
մենք հանդիպում ենք
իմ
կարդացած
գրքերում,
իմ
թարգմանած
լուսանկարներում
ու
քո
ֆիլմերում։
ես փորձում ինձ/քեզ/մեզ չպատկերացնել
ձեռքի հեռավորության վրա։
կարողացա ինձ թույլ տալ զայրանալ,
եւ մեր ընկերությունը չփլվեց։
այսօր սպիտակի երկաշարժի օրն է,
ու ես վախենում եմ, որ մի օր երեւանը կփլվի։
որտե՞ղ կլինեմ ես։
կամ։ կաս։ կանք։
երեկ սովորել եմ
Aujourd’ hui, je suis poussière
արտահայտությունը,
բայց դեռ չեմ կարողանում կարդալ։
ավերակ եմ,
առանց շարժվելու ցնցվում եմ,
ուրեմն շուտով արյուն կգա։
ոչ այլ մարմիններից։
դաշտ(ան)
մտածում էի շուշանի եւ շուշանիկի (,) սիրո մասին,
երբ (՞)
շուշաննան
ասաց,
որ
այս քաղաքն իրեն չի սիրում։
ինչ որ պահից (այս քաղաքում) երկինքն էլ չի երեւա։
այս մեռած օդը ճպխում է ինձ,
եւ ես մարմին չունեմ։
երեւան, դեկտեմբեր, 2025թ.
երեկ շարժապատկերներ դաջեցի,
ու մի տեքստ եկավ մտքիս։
քեզ կուղարկեմ։
բացիկը հինգ օր շարունակ 1-5 օր է ցույց տալիս,
եւ ես (դրանից) կազմաքնադվում եմ։
ուղարկել մի բան եւ չիմանալ՝.։
կհասնի, թե՞ չէ։
երբ
ինձ
ուղարկեցի
հասա։
հիմա հետ եմ եկել,
ու չգիտեմ, թե ուր
եմ։
քաոտիկ ժամանակներ են։
քաոտիկ բառը նույնքան փոշոտ է,
որքան վատ լինելու, չլինելու սահմանները։
պարզ չի, թե ինչի եւ ում համար տեղ կա
այս քաղաքում։
պարզ չի՝ ուր գնալ,
երբ ինձ համար չկա։
պարզ չի,
թե
որտեղ
կա։
տեղ։
ինչ որ մի օր ես կուտեմ երեւանի բոլոր pain au chocolat-ները։
ֆրանսերենը սովորում եմ էնպես, ոնց հինգ-վեց տարեկանում հայերենն էի սովորում։
ուզում եմ կարողանալ
ինչ որ մեկին
սիրել
այնպես,
ոնց շուշան ավագյանի տեքստերն եմ
սիրում,
եւ
նույնքան սիրով ու ըմբոստությամբ հարաբերվել մարդկանց հետ,
որքան՝ պատկերի ու տեքստի։
մի տարի առաջ
գրել եմ
«շատ գեղեցիկ են Ձեր կոլաժները»
մեկնաբանությունը։
դու դրանից առաջ էիր շոյել իմ լուսանկարները,
բայց ես այդ չէի հիշում։
երբեք չեմ մոռանում
«արվեստն է մեզ միավորել, թռչնակ»
արտահայտությունը,
եւ որ ընկերությունն ամենակարեւոր հարաբերությունն է ինձ համար։
երբեք չեմ մոռանում։
pain au chocolat
կապակցության մեջ ցավ կա,
երբ երեք լեզու գիտես եւ սովորում ես չորրորդը։
մի օր ես կհասնեմ փարիզի նուպար գրադարան
ու կփորձեմ արխիվային թղթերի վրա խոնավ հետքեր չթողնել։
այլեւս հաշտ եմ ուրիշների գանգուր մազերի հետ։
գիրք-անվերնագիր։
գիրք-հարցադրում։
квир, это мариам.
տարօրինակ(ելով) երեւանը։
մենք հանդիպում ենք
իմ
կարդացած
գրքերում,
իմ
թարգմանած
լուսանկարներում
ու
քո
ֆիլմերում։
ես փորձում ինձ/քեզ/մեզ չպատկերացնել
ձեռքի հեռավորության վրա։
կարողացա ինձ թույլ տալ զայրանալ,
եւ մեր ընկերությունը չփլվեց։
այսօր սպիտակի երկաշարժի օրն է,
ու ես վախենում եմ, որ մի օր երեւանը կփլվի։
որտե՞ղ կլինեմ ես։
կամ։ կաս։ կանք։
երեկ սովորել եմ
Aujourd’ hui, je suis poussière
արտահայտությունը,
բայց դեռ չեմ կարողանում կարդալ։
ավերակ եմ,
առանց շարժվելու ցնցվում եմ,
ուրեմն շուտով արյուն կգա։
ոչ այլ մարմիններից։
դաշտ(ան)
մտածում էի շուշանի եւ շուշանիկի (,) սիրո մասին,
երբ (՞)
շուշաննան
ասաց,
որ
այս քաղաքն իրեն չի սիրում։
ինչ որ պահից (այս քաղաքում) երկինքն էլ չի երեւա։
այս մեռած օդը ճպխում է ինձ,
եւ ես մարմին չունեմ։
երեւան, դեկտեմբեր, 2025թ.
February 4, 2025
Come ci si avvicina a un libro come questo? Ammetto, infatti, la difficoltà di districarsi nei meandri di una "storia" che solo parzialmente si può leggere come un romanzo.
La premessa è la biografia di due scrittrici armene quasi dimenticate che sono riportate alla ribalta da altre due studiose che ne vogliono riprendere la valenza letteraria e politica.
Entrambe perseguitate dal potere costituito per le loro posizioni anti-sistema, scrivono e pubblicano ma le loro opere sono apertamente boicottate o addirittura strumentalizzate. L'Armenia sovietica ne soffoca l'istinto libertario e poco a poco finiscono in un oblio ingiustificato.
Ciò che questo breve testo propone è un meta-romanzo costruito come un botta e risposta tra passato e presente, dove la passione ritrovata oggi si specchia nello yesterday inventato (o no?). Ciò che questo breve testo propone è un meta-romanzo costruito come un botta e risposta tra passato e presente, dove la passione ritrovata oggi si specchia nello yesterday inventato (o no?).
Così, in rapida successione e senza alcun avviso che non sia la propria sensibilità di lettore, scorrono cartoline mai inviate del novecento, dialoghi contemporanei, estratti di poesie e mille altri frammenti di un puzzle che non ha soluzione. O che ne ha mille, secondo la predisposizione di chi legge.
Ma questa cosa funziona? Ottiene il risultato di affascinare il lettore non prevenuto? Dà alla letteratura post-moderna una ragione in più per non essere soffocata dalla propria smodata ambizione? Per me, solo in parte. Perché è vero che la frammentazione del racconto raggiunge l'obiettivo dello straniamento, effetto volontario dell'autrice a dimostrazione che nessuno è profeta in patria.
D'altra parte, però, in appendice è inserita una sorta di vademecum per impedire che il lettore si senta pure lui protagonista dell'esilio. Allora tanto valeva non lanciare il guanto della sfida. Resta un originale tour de force da leggere con molta curiosità e se non si viene travolti, va bene lo stesso.
La premessa è la biografia di due scrittrici armene quasi dimenticate che sono riportate alla ribalta da altre due studiose che ne vogliono riprendere la valenza letteraria e politica.
Entrambe perseguitate dal potere costituito per le loro posizioni anti-sistema, scrivono e pubblicano ma le loro opere sono apertamente boicottate o addirittura strumentalizzate. L'Armenia sovietica ne soffoca l'istinto libertario e poco a poco finiscono in un oblio ingiustificato.
Ciò che questo breve testo propone è un meta-romanzo costruito come un botta e risposta tra passato e presente, dove la passione ritrovata oggi si specchia nello yesterday inventato (o no?). Ciò che questo breve testo propone è un meta-romanzo costruito come un botta e risposta tra passato e presente, dove la passione ritrovata oggi si specchia nello yesterday inventato (o no?).
Così, in rapida successione e senza alcun avviso che non sia la propria sensibilità di lettore, scorrono cartoline mai inviate del novecento, dialoghi contemporanei, estratti di poesie e mille altri frammenti di un puzzle che non ha soluzione. O che ne ha mille, secondo la predisposizione di chi legge.
Ma questa cosa funziona? Ottiene il risultato di affascinare il lettore non prevenuto? Dà alla letteratura post-moderna una ragione in più per non essere soffocata dalla propria smodata ambizione? Per me, solo in parte. Perché è vero che la frammentazione del racconto raggiunge l'obiettivo dello straniamento, effetto volontario dell'autrice a dimostrazione che nessuno è profeta in patria.
D'altra parte, però, in appendice è inserita una sorta di vademecum per impedire che il lettore si senta pure lui protagonista dell'esilio. Allora tanto valeva non lanciare il guanto della sfida. Resta un originale tour de force da leggere con molta curiosità e se non si viene travolti, va bene lo stesso.
August 27, 2024
I picked this up purely because I've been trying to find some fiction in translation by an Armenian author. Unfortunately, this book's concept is so specialized, and the approach is so experimental, that I really didn't get much out of it. The premise is that two real-life Armenian feminist writers (Shusanik Kurghinian and Zabel Yesayan) from the early part of the 20th-century engage in an imagined dialogue. Both were suppressed and censored as writers, as was the author of this book, so there are metatextual threads woven throughout. The other storyline is a dialogue between the author and Yesayna's biographer. Also injected into the mix are renderings of Kurghinian's poems, whose titles also serve as chapter titles.
Originally published in 2006, the translated version presented here attempts to ease the reader in with a 5-page "note" on the historical background. It certainly helps, but what is much more helpful is the 10-page "Chapter Guides" that appears after the body of the text. I really wish these had appeared as footnotes throughout, rather than my discovering them after the fact, as they would have been really helpful in navigating the text. This volume concludes with a 30-page afterward by the translator that raises interesting questions about the nature of translation in such a work. It's also jammed with hyper-academic invocations of literary theory, queer theory, feminist theory, postcolonial theory, and probably others I missed... Readers who enjoy experimental writing that surfs those waves may find something to enjoy here, but the appeal is going to be very limited for the more general reader.
Originally published in 2006, the translated version presented here attempts to ease the reader in with a 5-page "note" on the historical background. It certainly helps, but what is much more helpful is the 10-page "Chapter Guides" that appears after the body of the text. I really wish these had appeared as footnotes throughout, rather than my discovering them after the fact, as they would have been really helpful in navigating the text. This volume concludes with a 30-page afterward by the translator that raises interesting questions about the nature of translation in such a work. It's also jammed with hyper-academic invocations of literary theory, queer theory, feminist theory, postcolonial theory, and probably others I missed... Readers who enjoy experimental writing that surfs those waves may find something to enjoy here, but the appeal is going to be very limited for the more general reader.
May 11, 2025
OK, according to the author, I'm a lazy reader, and while I have no issues with experimental music, I'm not a fan of experimental art, dance, and now it seems, prose. I loved the premise of the book, but being woefully unfamiliar with the works of either Kurghinian or Yesayan, I hadn't planned on picking it up until I was. I was "forced" to read it as part of a book club, prematurely, and quickly understood that such a familiarity with the two authors' works wouldn't have helped me much either way. Let those with more artistic mindsets enjoy the abstract and leave me to my more straightforward literature.
Read
March 24, 2024"Sometimes, reader, the typist/writer forgets to put quotation marks around cited words or sentences.
Does that mean she steals others' words?
Which is worse: To let the living words of the poet die in damp boxes in dark, treacherous rooms or to sow them like seeds, mixed with another's words, to revive them and let them bloom in untitled fields?
Besides, quotation marks privatize words and make them someone else's property.
The words belong neither to the typist/writer nor to you, reader.
They simply unite our past, present, and future."
Does that mean she steals others' words?
Which is worse: To let the living words of the poet die in damp boxes in dark, treacherous rooms or to sow them like seeds, mixed with another's words, to revive them and let them bloom in untitled fields?
Besides, quotation marks privatize words and make them someone else's property.
The words belong neither to the typist/writer nor to you, reader.
They simply unite our past, present, and future."
April 1, 2024
It is a difficult book but a real experience. A person like me, who knows almost nothing about Ottoman empire and these Armenian authors, I belive can only enjoy it if you don't focus too much on understanding EVERY SINGLE WORD that is in the text. Though, the more you go through the book, the more feelings you get. I have to say that I am also giving the 4 starts thanks to the translator afterwork, which made me realize all the things I have been reading even further.
August 15, 2025
After finishing Shushanik Avagyan’s “Girq, anvernagir” (A book, untitled), I sat in silence, not knowing what to do. This was an important journey and a lesson. The book did “turn my body into a heterotopia,” where I digested a lot of crucial ideas and became a different person. I cannot stress enough how necessary it is to read and think, really think about the message. Avagyan’s writing style can feel strange at times, however, it will suck you in and leave you breathless.
February 3, 2025
ho voluto iniziarlo per le belle recensioni che vedevo, ma la verità è che non sono riuscita a leggerlo
sicuramente non sono riuscita a capirlo, ma dal mio punto di vista è scritto in modo troppo disordinato, troppo tutto per me
sicuramente non sono riuscita a capirlo, ma dal mio punto di vista è scritto in modo troppo disordinato, troppo tutto per me
October 17, 2025
Non so come fare questa review, e forse questa sensazione è esattamente l’obiettivo di questo libro. Un libro esperienza, ti lascia ad ogni pagina o quasi un qualcosa di così profondo, penetrante che è davvero impossibile recensirlo adeguatamente.
January 31, 2024
Whatever it is we don’t understand, we condemn.
January 8, 2025
(3.5⭐️)
A wonderful headache remains a headache
A wonderful headache remains a headache
January 10, 2025
Affascinante, coinvolgente, straniante. Lettura affatto semplice che si snoda attraverso molteplici livelli.
March 25, 2025
La tematica potrebbe pure essere interessante se non fosse per uno stile narrativo decisamente insopportabile, quasi illeggibile. Uno dei libri peggiori che ho letto in questo 2025.
December 31, 2024
The struggle of, wanting to learn something from what you read but what you read being a high enough quality that it can refuse to dumb it down for you (so hard it won't even title itself), is strong here.
Edit: I keep thinking about the (fascinating) Translator's Afterword, describing the necessary interpretation work a translator has to do using the example of a chapter title rendered in English as 'Inapostolicism', which the author corrected to 'Raquel-lessness'. I keep imagining that exchange, the translator going... 'without... the apostolic church?' and the author like... 'no no, without Raquel. Raquel wasn't there 🤣'.
Edit: I keep thinking about the (fascinating) Translator's Afterword, describing the necessary interpretation work a translator has to do using the example of a chapter title rendered in English as 'Inapostolicism', which the author corrected to 'Raquel-lessness'. I keep imagining that exchange, the translator going... 'without... the apostolic church?' and the author like... 'no no, without Raquel. Raquel wasn't there 🤣'.
April 14, 2024
Գիրքը կարդալիս` ասես թաքնված լինես հերոսների ծոցագրպանում և պարբերաբար թաքուն գլուխդ դուրս հանես ու ուսումնասիրես կյանքն իրենց աչքերով։ Շատ եմ սիրել թե՛ գաղափարը, թե՛ ոճը, թե՛ պատմությունը։ Շուշան Ավագյանը ժամանակակից սիրելի գրողներից է։
July 29, 2025
Non so cosa ho letto, ma bellissimo e poetico
Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews