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His immense self-pity, his demand for sympathy poured and spread itself in pools at her feet, and all she did, miserable sinner that she was, was to draw her skirts a little closer round her ankles, lest she should get wet. In complete silence she stood there, grasping her paint brush.

~ Lily Briscoe’s response to Mr. Ramsay in Virginia Woolf’s To The Lighthouse

I’ve been thinking of this scene from To The Lighthouse, a novel that I have read at least a half dozen times, as the horsemen of the apocalypse continue their erratic assaults on all our systems and institutions. Of course, their doings are more depraved and destructive than Mr. Ramsay’s patriarchal self-pity and narcissism, but there is much to learn from Lily Briscoe’s refusal, her drawing her skirts closer to her ankles, and holding onto her paint brush as a tool and a weapon.

What is pooling at our feet is not water, but shit, because as Steve Bannon had recommended, they are spreading the stuff with great abandon. “The Democrats don’t matter,” Bannon told writer Michael Lewis in 2018. “The real opposition is the media. And the way to deal with them is to flood the zone with shit.”

Journalists are kept busy writing about the latest outrage, and the rest of us are barely able to react to one horrible news item before the next one appears. As AOC put it in a February Instagram live: “It’s important for you to understand that the paralysis and shock that you feel right now is the point,” she continued. “They are trying to induce a state of passivity among the general public.”

We must pay attention to what they are doing, but we can’t afford to let them overwhelm us with their crap to the point that we are paralyzed. I glance at the headlines, read various newsletters on topics that concern me, and check out the social media feeds of trusted sources who cover Palestine, the academy, immigration, climate catastrophe, abortion, and policing. During the horsemen’s last reign, a friend recommended a daily roundup curated by Matt Kiser called WTF Just Happened Today, and I find it particularly helpful—Kiser reads the day’s political news and starts with “what happened today in one sentence.” Below that are paragraphs with links going into more depth for those who are interested.

In addition to keeping abreast of the news (without being inundated), I try to push back against their cruelty in the way that I can each day. It’s up to each of us to decide what we care most about and to find the best people working on that issue and then to act. When people ask my spouse James what they should do in the face of the genocide in Gaza or any of the other depredations we are witnessing, he replies, “Do something.”

Yours in struggle,

Nancy K

READ & LISTEN

A long, thoughtful, and essential piece by Taner Akcam about the crisis in Holocaust and Genocide Studies brought about by the genocidal campaign in Gaza.

Publisher’s Weekly finally ran a review of THE BURNING HEART OF THE WORLD, saying, “…the lyrical latest from Nancy Kricorian…is an impactful story of trauma.”

A piece that I wrote about the Armenian genocide, Gaza, and Columbia that was published on April 24 by YES Magazine.

James’s speech at the 25-hour Columbia Speak Out (his is the second one).

I recorded a Podcast interview with Meat for Tea, and did a print interview with LibraryThing in which I discuss my research process, the female bildungsroman, and things Armenian.

Part of the job of being a writer is promoting one’s books, and while I love to praise and promote the work of my friends and mentees, I generally feel uncomfortable trumpeting my own. The current political climate creates an added emotional dissonance—in the face of increasing daily violence and moral shocks, how to hustle to sell a book?

These are scary times. Again, in any direction you look people, their rights, and their well-being are under attack. We are reading about the roundup and imprisonment of dissident foreign graduate students, and witnessing the crushing of our institutions (including a front row seat for the capitulation at Columbia). Palestinian poet Mosab Abu Toha canceled a 16-event national tour because he is subject to a doxxing and smear campaign by far-right organization Betar USA, that has been handing over lists of people it wants deported. The situation in Gaza is truly heinous, with food aid rotting at the border while hunger is rampant and bombings continuous. The announced “voluntary migration plan” for the ethnic cleansing of Gaza is truly sickening.

But we somehow need to keep going, to live our lives, to do our work, take care of our families, and gather with organizations and groups that are fighting the worst of these harms. Palestinian poet and writer Mohammed El Kurd posted some words on Twitter that resonated strongly for me:

the basics: fascism thrives on fear. they want you to be silent, to self-censor, to do less. you will not recover whatever ground you concede. the moment calls for caution, not hysteria. courage, not cowardice. if the objective is fear, be unafraid. dissent.

My writing is also a form of dissidence. As I say in a recently published essay about the making of The Burning Heart of the World in the Armenian Weekly:

April 2025 is the 50th anniversary of the start of the Lebanese Civil War and the 110th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. My novel reverberates with both of these cataclysms, and it appears at a time when Lebanon and Armenia have just experienced more paroxysms of violence, suffering under existential threats to their sovereignty and territorial integrity. My novel is a journey through these histories and into this burning heart of the world. The title evokes both illumination and conflagration. The world is on fire, and while there is much darkness in the book, there is also humor, empathy and a commitment to amplifying that which is humane in the human. This last is central to my literary project.

The official publication date of my novel is April 1, and I am in Los Angeles for its launch. I have four evening events this week—in conversation at Diesel Books with Talar Chahinian on Monday, a panel discussion with my friends Joanne Nucho, Mashinka Hakopian, and Ara Oshagan on Tuesday at OxyArts, in conversation on Wednesday at the Glendale Central Library with my friend Shahe Mankerian, and a Thursday literary salon featuring poets Lory Bedikian, Arthur Kayzakian, and me hosted by Red Hen Press in Pasadena. The following week in New York, I will be in conversation with Marianne Hirsch at Knox Hall in Morningside Heights on April 7th, and with Raffi Khatchadourian at Greenlight Bookstore in Brooklyn on April 9. On April 15^th I will be in conversation with Nanore Barsoumian at NAASR in Belmont, MA, and on April 17^th with Lisa Gulesserian at Porter Square Books in Cambridge. For people who are not in these localities, the April 15^th event at NAASR will be hybrid with viewing options via Zoom and YouTube. More events are being scheduled for May and June.

May we find the courage to keep speaking out. May we find the strength to protect each other.

Yours in struggle,

Nancy K

RECOMMENDED READING

Variety: Mark Ruffalo, Penélope Cruz and 500 Oscar Voters Sign Hamdan Ballal Letter

Israeli historian Ilan Pappe on the end of Zionism.

My friend Patty Kaishian curated this show at the New York State Museum about the life and work of mycologist Mary Banning.

James Schamus on Andrew Ahn’s updated Wedding Banquet.

Last week’s excitement was the arrival of the advanced reading copies of my novel THE BURNING HEART OF THE WORLD from Red Hen Press. (You may preorder the novel from Bookshop by using this link that supports the International Armenian Literary Alliance.) I am in the process of correcting the page proofs, and I have been working with the publicist to set up book events for the spring. The full details are not yet available but below is an overview of the current lineup.

March 26-29 AWP Conference in Los Angeles, events at the Red Hen Press booth

Monday, March 31 at Diesel Books in Brentwood, in conversation with Talar Chahinian

Tuesday, April 1 panel at OxyArts with Mashinka Firunts Hakopian, Joanne Nucho, Ara Oshagan

Wednesday, April 2 at the Glendale Public Library in conversation with Shahe Mankerian

Thursday, April 3 at Red Hen Press in Pasadena with poets Lory Bedikian and Arthur Kayzakian

Monday, April 7 at Columbia University in conversation with Marianne Hirsch

Wednesday, April 9 at Greenlight Bookstore in Brooklyn in conversation with Raffi Khatchadourian

Tuesday, April 15 at NAASR in Belmont in conversation with Nanore Barsoumian

Thursday, April 17 at Porter Square Books in Cambridge in conversation with Lisa Gulesserian

Sunday, April 27 in the Detroit area for the local Armenian community

It’s December now and we have a winter to get through, but April and the book launch are on the horizon.

When I was growing up, each year in December, our small Armenian Evangelical Church would put on a Christmas pageant featuring a manger scene, complete with the requisite holy family, three kings, some shepherds, and an array of angels. We sang carols from a small white booklet with red-cheeked choir boys on the cover, and among my favorites were “We Three Kings of Orient Are,” probably because of the dirgeful key, and “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen.” Just now when I was thinking of the chorus of that second song, I misremembered it as “tidings of comfort and light,” when it is actually “comfort and joy.”

Joy seems a bit too ambitious for this holiday season as the horsemen of the apocalypse, many more than four of them, are galloping towards us. I’ve lately stopped asking people, “How are you?” which is too fraught a question in these troubled times, and instead have been saying, “It’s so good to see you.” And there is nothing better right now than gathering in the real world with friends, family, and comrades. We need each other now more than ever.

Wishing you comfort and light,

Nancy K

THIS MONTH’S RECOMMENDATIONS

READ

The latest issue of Wasafiri Magazine, entitled Armenia(n)s—Elevation is now available for purchase. My essay “His Driving Life,” about my late father and his relationship to motor vehicles, is available for free download to the first 50 readers. If you miss the chance for the free version, let me know and I will send you the PDF.

A powerful essay about life in Shujaiya in Northern Gaza entitled The Mirror by Nadera Mushtha, one of my We Are Not Numbers mentees. (Nadera’s GoFundMe is here.)

“The Bullet,” a poem by Sahar Rabah, translated from the Arabic by Ammiel Alcalay. Sahar was accepted into the MFA Program in Creative Writing at Rutgers/Newark, but she has had to defer her admission because she is unable to leave Gaza. The crossings are closed to all but a handful of severely injured people who have been allowed to evacuate for medical care abroad.

LISTEN

For the London Review of Books podcast, Adam Shatz interviewed Dr. Ghassan Abu Sittah, a pediatric plastic and reconstructive surgeon, and journalist Muhammad Shehada about Gaza’s past, present, and future.

The Intercept’s Briefing “Syria: What Comes Next?” is an excellent and informative interview with Syrian journalist Rami Jarrah.

WATCH

Indiewire’s 17 Best First Films of 2024 includes our progeny Noah’s Summer Solstice, which is described as a “sun-dappled and warmly directed buddy comedy.” If you haven’t yet seen it, the film is currently streaming on several platforms.

Nancy Kricorian