Thursday, April 25, 2013 ************************************* VARIATIONS ON A FAMILIAR THEME ************************************************ After behaving like swine they assert moral superiority. This is as true of nations and tribes as it is of empires; as true of the Ottoman Empire as it is of our own political parties and mafias. * When a fanatic says “God is on my side,” you can be sure of one thing: he can’t tell the difference between God and the Devil. * All belief systems are perversions. * Not to expose lies means being subservient to liars. # ONLY IN AMERICA **************************** In America if you fail as a writer you can make a comfortable living as a teacher of creative writing. * I don’t know what they do in Armenia but in the Diaspora you make yourself as invisible as possible – not to be the bud of jokes as a vodanavorji or a medavoragan (freely translated as versifier and assh*le). * ONLY IN ARMENIA ************************ Where idiots are in charge, the smart will be persecuted. * Ours is a nation whose lunatic fringe is the dominant minority. * Literature is to the mind as water is to the thirsty and bread to the hungry. But some people experience neither thirst nor hunger because they are walking cadavers. * Politicians create enemies to cover up the fact that they are the real enemies. # ON EVIL & RELATED ATROCITIES ******************* The only way to understand evil is to recognize it within us. Which is why the judgment of the self-righteous cannot be trusted – and who could be more self-righteous than bishops, imams, and rabbis who speak in the name of god? * One man’s god may be another’s devil. * To be diplomatic, tolerant, and civilized means to say the opposite of what you think and feel. * After I make an assertion I am haunted by its contradiction. * To be a writer means to be a re-writer. #