It’s the time of year when everyone is putting out Top Ten lists and gift recommendations. Here is my minimalist response—three of my favorite books of the year: a graphic memoir by Roz Chast, a collection of poems by Najwan Darwish, and a new translation of a 1935 memoir by Zabel Yessayan. Happy reading and happy New Year!
Roz Chast, Can’t We Talk about Something More Pleasant? Bloomsbury USA (May 2014)
In her first memoir, cartoonist Roz Chast brings her signature wit to the topic of aging parents. Spanning the last several years of their lives and told through four-color cartoons, family photos, and documents, Chast’s memoir is both comfort and comic relief for anyone experiencing the life-altering loss of elderly parents.
Najwan Darwish, Nothing More to Lose (translated from the Arabic by Kareen James Abu-Zeid), New York Review of Books Poets (April 2014)
Nothing More to Lose is the first collection of poems by Palestinian poet Najwan Darwish to appear in English. Hailed across the Arab world and beyond, Darwish’s poetry walks the razor’s edge between despair and resistance, between dark humor and harsh political realities. With incisive imagery and passionate lyricism, Darwish confronts themes of equality and justice while offering a radical, more inclusive, rewriting of what it means to be both Arab and Palestinian living in Jerusalem, his birthplace.
Zabel Yessayan, The Gardens of Silidhar (translated from the Armenian by Jennifer Manoukian), AIWA Press (2014)
This memoir originally published in Armenian in 1935, is a beautiful, evocative narrative of Yessayan’s childhood and a vivid account of Armenian community life in Constantinople (Istanbul) at the end of the nineteenth century. Author, educator, and social activist, Zabel Yessayan (1878-1943) is recognized today as one of the greatest writers in Western Armenian literature.
Nancy Kricorian
December 14, 2014